<p>The concept of democracy is of importance to the Swedish educational system. The best proof of that is the central position democracy has had in the education program we attended at the Örebro university. This study analyses the concept of democracy and its leading foundation, namely the so-called “deliberative dialog”. The last is belived to be an ideal of democracy which schools in Sweden should follow. This is at least how prominent academics and advocates of “deliberative dialog” Tomas Englund and Jurgen Habermas, see this phenomenon and its role in our schools.</p><p>Pierre Bourdieu, French sociologist and social theorist has though shown that there is danger in believing that dialog is the only foundation of democracy. Accordig to him in every dialog exists a certan power struggle. What Bourdieu really means is that in a dialog actors are not equal, but there is great risk that some actors get dominated by other actors. These different views of dialog and its role in the school world has inspired us. In our study we wanted to see whether there are students or groups of students, that based on gender or ethnicity are dominated by other students in the everyday classroom dialog.</p><p>The empirical part of the study shows that those who were not activly engaged in the observed classroom dialog were boys of Swedish origin. The study also shows that those who seemed to have no problem with an active participation in the classroom dialog were girls, and very often girls of Swedish origin.The results of this study are though not completely unambiguous. As the group of students we observed were of differnt gender and came from different ethnic backgrounds we choose to see them as individuals. That means that they as individuals have differnt abilities when it comes to adapt to the climate of the classroom.</p>

The concept of democracy is of importance to the Swedish educational system. The best proof of that is the central position democracy has had in the education program we attended at the Örebro university. This study analyses the concept of democracy and its leading foundation, namely the so-called “deliberative dialog”. The last is belived to be an ideal of democracy which schools in Sweden should follow. This is at least how prominent academics and advocates of “deliberative dialog” Tomas Englund and Jurgen Habermas, see this phenomenon and its role in our schools. Pierre Bourdieu, French sociologist and social theorist has though shown that there is danger in believing that dialog is the only foundation of democracy. Accordig to him in every dialog exists a certan power struggle. What Bourdieu really means is that in a dialog actors are not equal, but there is great risk that some actors get dominated by other actors. These different views of dialog and its role in the school world has inspired us. In our study we wanted to see whether there are students or groups of students, that based on gender or ethnicity are dominated by other students in the everyday classroom dialog. The empirical part of the study shows that those who were not activly engaged in the observed classroom dialog were boys of Swedish origin. The study also shows that those who seemed to have no problem with an active participation in the classroom dialog were girls, and very often girls of Swedish origin.The results of this study are though not completely unambiguous. As the group of students we observed were of differnt gender and came from different ethnic backgrounds we choose to see them as individuals. That means that they as individuals have differnt abilities when it comes to adapt to the climate of the classroom.

The purpose of this study is to examine how the concept of democracy and education for democracy are formulated in school policy documents related to the four teacher’s description of their work with democracy in the civic subject. The study is based on the following questions:  What type of democracy is presented in the school curriculum as well as other school policy documents? How do the participant teachers understand democracy? How do the participant teachers describe and motivate their work with democracy? This study is made through a qualitative method based on a contextual analysis and interviews with four teachers working in grade 1-3. The study is based on two theoretical extensions and these are electoral-, participate-, deliberate democracy and the traditional- , liberal progressive-, social critical orientated views. Common to the four school policy documents that have been analysed, the most prominent conceptions of and approaches to democracy is participatory and deliberative democratic perspectives. The results show that the school documents and the teacher’s description of democracy rarely mention electoral democracy. However, it can be seen in the school policy documents that there is a notion that knowledge about democracy.  That is, knowledge of political ideologies and the selection process, is required to enable participatory and deliberative democracy.  Teachers understanding of democracy show mainly participatory democracy perspective. However, it has come to shown from the interviews that the teacher’s description of their work with democracy in the civic subject mainly shows deliberative perspectives. One conclusion of this study is that the documents and the teachers' descriptions of democracy and education for democracy are quite similar.

Syftet är att ta reda på hur samhällskunskapslärare kan hantera kontroversiella frågor i undervisningen. Detta genom att undersöka vilka perspektiv som förekommer inom forskningen. Uppsatsen ämnar vara en kunskapsöversikt över relevant pedagogisk forskning. I resultatet framgår det att deliberativa perspektivet och agonism är de mest framträdandeperspektiven när det kommer till hur lärare bör förhålla sig kring kontroversiella frågor. Uppsatsen landar i slutsatsen att båda perspektiven ger svar på arbetets frågeställning men att perspektiven lämpar sig olika väl beroende på om läraren vill att eleverna ska skapa en kollektivviljebildning eller om de ska öva på att tycka olika.

Syftet med denna kunskapsöversikt är att undersöka om och i så fall hur tanken om medborgerlig bildning influerar historieundervisningen i skolan och eventuella utvecklingsmöjligheter. Det görs utifrån en frågeställning “Vad säger forskningen om hur medborgerlig bildning kan påverka undervisningen i historieämnet?”. Metoden har främst utgjorts av sökprocesser i olika databaser där relevanta sökord har använts. Dessa sökord har behandlat medborgerlig bildning och historieämnet i skolan. Forskningen visar att skolan är en av de främsta institutionerna när det kommer till medborgerlig bildning och förväntas utveckla både kunskaper och värderingar hos eleverna. Dessa två egenskaper är de som oftast lyfts fram som centrala för medborgarfostran i forskningen. Dessutom utgör de även två motpoler som lärare måste förhålla sig till och i detta uppstår viss problematik. Det visar sig att många lärare har svårt att finna ett samspel mellan värdegrunden och kunskapskraven och medvetet eller omedvetet lägger tyngd vid den ena eller andra. En möjlig lösning är det deliberativa samtalet som syftar till att möjliggöra en öppen, normkritisk dialog där alla får komma till tals.

För att skapa en demokratisk kompetens har uppsatsen påvisat att detbehövs politisk kompetens samt politisk systemtilltro. Den mestframkomliga vägen för detta är genom deliberativa samtal. Deliberativasamtal förs ofta inom samhällskunskapsundervisningen men väldigtsällan med EU som ämne. EU presenteras fortfarande ofta i ettutrikespolitiskt perspektiv. Av de strukturella hinder som föreligger ärtidsfristen det mest avgörande för adekvat undervisning.

Young male vocational students are in academia described as being less interested by politics and social issues and having less knowledge regarding democracy than other students. A culture of resistance is the appellation of the specific culture that emphasise the relations between young male vocational students. Deliberately arranged teaching with deliberate qualities has shown a positive impact on students’ learning as well as being a way of working with moral issues in school. The purpose of this study is to make researches into whether deliberately arranged teaching has an impact on  the political and social interest amongst young male vocational students. A questionnaire was conducted before and after the Civics A (social studies) course. Individual interviews, where the students’ ways of expressing themselves in regards to politics and social issues were in focus, were carried out. The deliberately arranged teaching was conducted once a week during one academic year. The students were then responsible for the content as well as ensuring that they abided by the set rules for the conversation. Limited alterations regarding the students’ interest for politics and social issues were identified in the questionnaire. However, the interviews revealed that some of the students have changed their way of looking at politics and their interest has increased. The culture of resistance that usually distinguishes the behaviour of vocational students in regards to core subjects was not found as a dominating factor. The students taking part in focus groups expressed a positive response to the deliberately arranged teaching stating it was the part of the course they enjoyed the most. To be able to express their views and listen to others was highly appreciated by the students who described themselves as serious and ambitious during classes. The teachers felt that this teaching style meant that there was a focus on relations and that the didactic question about content in the course were more complicated to execute.