Thesis (M.A.)--Wheaton College Graduate School, 2005. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 67-68).

This thesis is an investigation into the university-level teaching of Buddhism in New Zealand, which has developed as part of the international spread of education about Buddhism for both Buddhists and non-Buddhists. The study was based on Interpretivism and accordingly sought to understand and interpret university teachers’ perceptions and experiences about their teaching of Buddhism; as they engage with the students' learning in this field. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were employed as the primary research method. All seven university teachers who teach Buddhism in New Zealand were invited to be the participants. Six university teachers participated in this research-study. Five of them were academic teachers, respectively teaching at Religious Studies of Massey, Victoria and Otago. Another one was a New Zealand-born Zen teacher who had been teaching a Zen meditation workshop at Auckland University of Technology for several years, and taught two Buddhism-related courses at the University of Auckland. These participants were chosen according to the information provided on official websites of New Zealand universities. The findings from the study showed that the university-level teaching of Buddhism in New Zealand, though growing, had been limited by the number of teachers and students. As fewer students were primarily interested in Buddhism, outward funding support appeared to be a very important factor for its future development. In terms of teachers’ role, objective-outsider remained the main position for scholars and scholar-practitioners in teaching Buddhism in university classroom. In addition to the pursuit of knowledge, there were also alternative educational opportunities, such as Zen workshop, for university staffs and students to learn Buddhism, outside university classroom. This thesis is significant in that it provided a bibliography and a set of data for the university-level teaching of Buddhism in the West, particularly New Zealand It established a space for future educational research into for the university-level teaching of Buddhism in the West, as part of the field of’ Buddhism and Education.’ In future studies, the limited approaches to teaching Buddhism in universities could be investigated on the basis of the literatures and findings of this study.

This thesis is an investigation into the university-level teaching of Buddhism in New Zealand, which has developed as part of the international spread of education about Buddhism for both Buddhists and non-Buddhists. The study was based on Interpretivism and accordingly sought to understand and interpret university teachers’ perceptions and experiences about their teaching of Buddhism; as they engage with the students' learning in this field. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were employed as the primary research method. All seven university teachers who teach Buddhism in New Zealand were invited to be the participants. Six university teachers participated in this research-study. Five of them were academic teachers, respectively teaching at Religious Studies of Massey, Victoria and Otago. Another one was a New Zealand-born Zen teacher who had been teaching a Zen meditation workshop at Auckland University of Technology for several years, and taught two Buddhism-related courses at the University of Auckland. These participants were chosen according to the information provided on official websites of New Zealand universities. The findings from the study showed that the university-level teaching of Buddhism in New Zealand, though growing, had been limited by the number of teachers and students. As fewer students were primarily interested in Buddhism, outward funding support appeared to be a very important factor for its future development. In terms of teachers’ role, objective-outsider remained the main position for scholars and scholar-practitioners in teaching Buddhism in university classroom. In addition to the pursuit of knowledge, there were also alternative educational opportunities, such as Zen workshop, for university staffs and students to learn Buddhism, outside university classroom. This thesis is significant in that it provided a bibliography and a set of data for the university-level teaching of Buddhism in the West, particularly New Zealand It established a space for future educational research into for the university-level teaching of Buddhism in the West, as part of the field of’ Buddhism and Education.’ In future studies, the limited approaches to teaching Buddhism in universities could be investigated on the basis of the literatures and findings of this study.

This thesis tries to historize the phenomenon of teaching religion in the Czech lands, especially in the period 1950-1956. In the first part of the thesis, the subject of interest is the analysis of the relationship between the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (CPCZ) and the Roman Catholic Church in order to create an appropriate framework for the empirical part. The second part of the thesis describes both the CPCZ strategy in the field of religious education and the concrete social practice associated with their implementation. As a result, the study maps a certain imaginary space between the ideological claim and the daily practice that is created in communication between communist elites, church secretaries, local officials, teachers and directors, church representatives, and believers themselves. The thesis concludes that in socialist education there was a certain effort to use religious teaching in the sense of socialist upbringing. However, since the end of the first half of the 1950s, this effort has been gradually reduced and all signs of the normality of teaching religion should have been reduced to a minimum, but the study shows that local practice has not always achieved this claim. It has always been limited by an effort not to go beyond the "legality" framework that could jeopardize...

The diploma thesis deals with the religious education at the church elementary school in the Czech Republic. The theoretical part describes the church elementary school, its history and its relation to the Framework Education Program for the Elementary Education and to the official documents and then it describes the religious education itself from the perspective of the aims and contents. The next part describes the participants of the religious education - the teachers of religious education and the characteristics of the children in the 4th and 5th grade in terms of developmental psychology. The final chapter of the theoretical part is dedicated to the researches that were carried out in the church elementary schools and in the religious education. The practical part of my diploma thesis is devoted to the research, which was carried out by means of questionnaire method. The aim of the practical part was to find how pupils of the 4th and 5th grades at the church elementary school in Prague view the subject of religious education using the questionnaire construction. The results of the research show that the pupils have mostly a positive relationship toward the subject. They consider it as a rather relaxing and amusing subject. In their eyes, the subject is connected to the faith and its symbols....

Religion plays a role in acculturating Nigerian immigrants into American society through networking and through belief systems that inculcate in Nigerian social and cultural norms practiced in the United States.

The purpose of the present study is to examine how a multicultural classroom affects the teaching of religion, and which conflicts teachers at secondary school and upper secondary school encounter in multicultural classrooms, as well as how these affect the school’s fundamental values. The study has been conducted through qualitative interviews with seven teachers who either teach religion at secondary school level or upper secondary school level.The study is based on the assumptions that multiculturalism affects teaching in the religion classroom and that there are conflicts where the conduct during the conflicts affects how schools work with their fundamental values. The study has a social constructionism approach where what teachers say about this study’s central concepts multiculturalism and conflict are studied. These concepts have then been used as a foundation for the analysis.The result of the study is that teachers are generally positive about a multicultural classroom for teaching religion; however, the study shows that there are both positive and negative aspects of this. The teachers in the study emphasized that the multicultural classroom, among other things, benefits the students' understanding of each other and that they can share and learn each other's experiences. The disadvantage of a multicultural classroom was considered by teachers to be the skepticism that can arise regarding their legitimacy as a mediator of knowledge. As for conflicts in the multicultural classroom in religion teaching, the result shows that teachers see conflicts as both positive and negative for the work on fundamental values, depending on its outcome. According to the teachers, a conflict can generate understanding and respect among the students, but also provide space for the students to express prejudices that lead to disagreements.Key

Religion as Part of School Education in Various European Countries The thesis in its first part describes the state of religious situation in Europe, it deals with the history of gradual secularisation of Europe, and it goes through the current state of the society as it regards the religion in social terms. The first part of the thesis is concluded by a summary of the theoretical knowledge on religious situation in Europe as far as the teaching of religion is concerned. The second part of the thesis concentrates on teaching religion in individual European states. It is based on an empirical study conducted in sixteen European states by H.G. Ziebertz called: "How Teachers in Europe Teach Religion". The thesis presents the results of the study and concludes them into general conclusions. It analyses the current state of teaching religion in the Czech Republic in more details with respect to general social climate there.

The relationship between religion (Church) and education (State) through religious education (RE) in Zambia has passed through different stages of development. During the missionary period (1883/1890- 1924), RE was, naturally, offered in the form of Religious Instruction (RI) and was thus fully denominational and confessional. Despite some general improvements in the provision of education, the subject remained largely confessional at the end of the colonial period (1925 - 1964). After Independence, the confessional model of the subject was inherited and continued throughout the First Republic (1964 - 72) and part of the Second Republic (1973 - 90). However, as a result of educational reforms started in the mid 1970s, RE became more educational by adopting an approach that was partly confessional and partly phenomenological from the mid 1980s. Despite new educational reforms in 1991/92 and after 1996, progressive development of RE as a curriculum subject seems to have been negatively affected by the state's self-contradictory declaration of Zambia as a Christian Nation in 1991. Thus the subject continued to be partly confessional and partly phenomenological during the Third Republic (1991 to date). While the state or Ministry of Education sees RE as a curriculum subject with educational aims like any other, research results show that many Zambians, especially members of different religious traditions, still see the subject as having confessional aims as well. However, since the country is pluralistic and democratic, RE in Zambia should continue developing in line with the constitutional values of religious and cultural freedom and the liberal national education policy provisions for spiritual and moral education. Thus the subject should go beyond its current unclear state of being largely confessional and partially phenomenological and become more educational; it should take the religious literacy and critical understanding model which takes both religious truth-claims and educational skills and understanding of religion seriously. To ensure this, a specific national policy which broadly outlines the nature and form of RE in schools needs to be put in place as a guide to all interest groups. / Religious Studies & Arabic / (D. Litt. et Phil. Religious Studies))

The relationship between religion (Church) and education (State) through religious education (RE) in Zambia has passed through different stages of development. During the missionary period (1883/1890- 1924), RE was, naturally, offered in the form of Religious Instruction (RI) and was thus fully denominational and confessional. Despite some general improvements in the provision of education, the subject remained largely confessional at the end of the colonial period (1925 - 1964). After Independence, the confessional model of the subject was inherited and continued throughout the First Republic (1964 - 72) and part of the Second Republic (1973 - 90). However, as a result of educational reforms started in the mid 1970s, RE became more educational by adopting an approach that was partly confessional and partly phenomenological from the mid 1980s. Despite new educational reforms in 1991/92 and after 1996, progressive development of RE as a curriculum subject seems to have been negatively affected by the state's self-contradictory declaration of Zambia as a Christian Nation in 1991. Thus the subject continued to be partly confessional and partly phenomenological during the Third Republic (1991 to date). While the state or Ministry of Education sees RE as a curriculum subject with educational aims like any other, research results show that many Zambians, especially members of different religious traditions, still see the subject as having confessional aims as well. However, since the country is pluralistic and democratic, RE in Zambia should continue developing in line with the constitutional values of religious and cultural freedom and the liberal national education policy provisions for spiritual and moral education. Thus the subject should go beyond its current unclear state of being largely confessional and partially phenomenological and become more educational; it should take the religious literacy and critical understanding model which takes both religious truth-claims and educational skills and understanding of religion seriously. To ensure this, a specific national policy which broadly outlines the nature and form of RE in schools needs to be put in place as a guide to all interest groups. / Religious Studies and Arabic / (D. Litt. et Phil. Religious Studies))