The school has a political and democratic mandate to teach and establish basic democratic values that our society is based in the teaching of students. The purpose of this study is to investigate how a number of four teachers interpret the meaning of democratic values. What is their personal inter-pretations which according to previous research proved to be open to interpretation? The aim was to see if there was a noticeable difference in the teachers interpretations towards each other. Another aim of the study was to gain insight on how teachers believe that they conduct their lessons to teach and establish basic democratic values. Are there any links to previous research that says that the teaching of fundamental values are not equal? The study's questions will therefore examine: ・ What do four different teachers consider the meaning of the basic democratic values? ・How do the teachers in the social studies field do systematically for the students to aquire basic democratic values and knowledge? ・ What are the differences in their interpretations of the democratic meaning of values and way of conducting their teaching in this area? To get answers, qualitative methods have been used through interview. As a theoretical approach, Laclau and Mouffes approach of discourse analysis has also been used. The conclusions I reach in the analysis of my material shows that the four teachers had a variety towards each other in their interpretation in the meaning of the basic democratic values. As a conse-quence was the teachings in the fundamental values not equivalent because they dealt with different areas of the values in their respective teaching.

The aim of this study is to know where swedish upper-secondary school students stand on issuesconcerning democratic values that have been set by the National Agency for Education. To answerthis, students with different variables will be compared, for example ethnicity and gender. Themethod used in this study is quantitative. Surveys were arranged and sent out to four different uppersecondary schools in Sweden in the region of Västernorrland. The questionnaires consisted of 2 parts,the first part was about the background variables and the second part was the questions, a total of 21questions were asked. 130 students participated in the survey. Previous research has shown that girlshave a more positive attitude towards democratic values than boys, and that students with parentsborn in Sweden who attend university preparatory programs have a better attitude on democraticvalues than foreign-born and vocational preparation programs. The results that this study showedwere in the same line as the previous surveys. However, due to lower responses and uneven numbersin the variables, further research is needed. / <p>Betygsdatum: 210510</p>

This paper studies how changing political, economic, and social conditions in and related to Sweden affected its secondary education policy and the role that social science didactics plays. By analyzing Swedish secondary school curricula, the related social science syllabus, education act, and corresponding organizational documents, the causes for, and context of education reform become clear. The school’s purpose is to impart general abilities and knowledge that all persons will require to function in society and maintain democracy, equality, and international solidarity. Additionally, the school is found to conform to the same template, values, and norms as the economic and political aspects of globalization and modern democratic society. The school subject that wholely addresses general knowledge, civil abilities, and democratic values is found to be social science. Engaging social issues as a didactical tool, social science teaching imparts in students democratic values and the civil abilities to participate in society. Through the quality assurance of evaluations, knowledge requirements emerged as a policy for providing students with the opportunity to learn at one’s capacity. By meeting its knowledge requirements, social science produces students who are stewards of democratic values that, by participating in the community, contribute to social development in every venture during life after school.

In the Manifesto on Values (2001), Ubuntu is depicted as one of the ten democratic values and the Department of Education (DoE, 2001) portrays it as one of the most important values to promote citizenry. Ubuntu provides a sense of belonging to a wider community and encourages a child citizen to live as a responsible and constructive member. Utilising a qualitative research mode of inquiry, with an action research approach enabled me to collaboratively design of a socially constructed learning experience, with subject specialists. We explored the value of creative drama to teach Ubuntu as an abstract concept to Grade 3 learners. The focus of this study was on conceptualisation and not the implementation. These learners were exposed to creative drama, however for this study they did not actively engage in any creative drama activities. The main data generation techniques that had been used in this study were semi-structured interviews with a panel of subject experts, after which they had also completed a rubric to convey the strengths and weaknesses of the designed learning experience. This was done in a cyclic manner; as embedded in action research to strengthen the idea of action research already mentioned. From the study and the results of the study, it had become evident that creative drama could be used to strengthen school learners’ understanding of Ubuntu and to incorporate it in their everyday lives to become progressive child citizens and leaders within South Africa. By using the input and knowledge of expert participants, it had also become evident that learning could be made fun and would most likely then be more effective. / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria 2020. / Early Childhood Education / MEd / Unrestricted

The purpose of this study is to examine and elaborate on the citizen dialogue in relation to project Västlänken. To enable this purpose we completed six semi-structured qualitative interviews with relevant actors. In order to examine the empirical data gained from the interviews, the study based its analytical framework upon Sherry R. Arnstein's ladder of citizens participation. Apart from Arnstein's theory the study also presents two of the most established planning theories within the research field which are combined with the representative and deliberative democratic values. Through the material that we have gathered, the study can conclude that representative democracy has been a prominent factor when it comes to the citizen dialogue whilst deliberative democracy has played a smaller part. Furthermore we can determine that one of the steps deriving from Arnstein's participation theory has been salient.

Magister Educationis - MEd / Schools played an important role during apartheid in shaping the mindsets of learners. In contemporary South Africa schools can now play a similar role in promoting democratic values in order to build a more just, humane and democratic society in a democratic South Africa. Through democratic citizenship, democratic schools can be created. Apple and Beane (1999, p. 10) state that democratic schools are the result of specific attempts by educators to put arrangements in place that will bring democracy to life. These arrangements and opportunities involve the production of democratic structures and processes through which life in a school is carried out and the creation of a curriculum that will allow young people the opportunity to experience the nature of democracy.

There is a lack of studies focusing on the analysis of the democratic values in preschool. Preschool teachers lack both the necessary knowledge and tools to be able to realize the assignment and to convert what is observed in practice into analysis. Thus, the purpose of the study is to investigate how democratic values are conveyed into equal treatment plans. The research questions are: How are democratic values conveyed into equal treatment plans? What democratic values are conveyed into equal treatment plans? The theory that has been used is based on an intersectional perspective and the concepts category, construction and values, which further function as analytical tools. The methodology was conducted as a qualitative text analysis through seven Swedish equal treatment plans for preschool. The results of the analysis show that equal treatment plans convey democratic values through promotion, prevention and remedial work. In addition, all equal treatment plans convey some of the following democratic values: All people's equal value, Human rights and freedoms, Protection of minorities, Diversity of opinions and characteristics and Non- violence.

The Bill of Rights (Constitution of the RSA, Act No. 108 of 1996) is a cornerstone of democracy in South Africa. It enshrines the rights of all people in the country and affirms the democratic values of human dignity, equality and freedom. As a legal instrument the Bill of Rights is open to differences in interpretation and understanding. The understanding and interpretation that educators attach to the rights contained in the Bill of Rights is of vital importance as it will determine how the upcoming generation will interpret and give meaning to these rights. The purpose of this study was to explore the human rights understanding of the educators at a Catholic school, and then to determine whether the understanding that these educators have about human rights concurs with the existing literature and where applicable, judgements of the Constitutional Court. A case study approach was undertaken with eight primary school educators at the school and using the evidence, collected from interviews conducted, the study found that as much as the understanding of the participants was generally in line with the literature and the Constitutional Court judgments, their understanding is largely theoretically based. As much as the participants have a clear understanding of the different rights, are able to attach meaning that is in line with universal definitions and does not transgress the legal bounds, the emergence of the nuanced opinions indicates that this understanding is limited by the values, traditions and societal norms that the participants associate themselves with and could lead to intolerance. In the final analysis, human rights and its associated concepts is defined and understood by individuals and groups of people in different ways. This understanding of human rights is intrinsically linked to culture, values, norms and societal perceptions. As a result, the understanding of this concept will differ from person to person and culture to culture. It is however possible that in many instances these different understandings are no more than different cultural and religious expressions of the same fundamental principles. As long as these different cultural and religious practises remain within the boundaries of the law, are not imposed on others and do not lead to intolerance, they should be respected and allowed to continue. These differences in interpretation, understanding and practise not only contribute to the ongoing debate around human rights and its associated concepts but in addition, contribute to the nurturing of democracy and freedom in South Africa. Where these differences in understanding, interpretation and practise become a contentious issue that cannot be resolved by the parties independently, as was the case in Christian Education SA v Minister of Education-CCT 4/00, the Constitutional Court can be approached in order to test the different understandings / interpretations and make an appropriate ruling on the matter. / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Education Management and Policy Studies / unrestricted

Skolverket (2019) always underlines the importance of implementing democratic values onto the students. But is this always easy to apply in the classroom? The purpose of this work is to examine how you can work with literature in different ways in the Swedish subject, with the focus of a multicultural and LGBTQ+ perspective. This work is for teachers and teacher students to create a bigger understanding around the possibilities of using literature. Our framing question is the following: “How can teachers work with literature texts from a multicultural and LGBTQ+ perspective, and how are the students affected?”. The method that has been used to produce this work has been by using databases to find information. Hence, there have been different selection methods to determine the usefulness and relevance of the different sources. The result showed that there are many different ways to use literature in the classroom, some with a better outcome than others. Furthermore, the lack of knowledge on how to work with or find multicultural and LGBTQ+ literature became visible. Nevertheless, it was noticed that both literature education from a multicultural and LGBTQ+ perspective is needed to create democratic values, since it develops the students critical thinking, their default natural setting, compassion and more. Through challenging students' default natural setting, the democratic society can be developed.

This study suggests that fiction can be used not only for language acquisition, but also for discussing democratic values. In this qualitative study, the aim is to understand how teachers use fiction, what approaches they have and explore what types of tasks the participants combine when working with fictional texts. Through online surveys and interviews with six in-service 7-9 teachers, we found that most participants use fiction to allow students to discover linguistic expressions, expand their vocabulary and learn new words within a concrete context. When teachers adopt a critical literacy approach and combine reading fiction with other tasks in other skills, it opens up a possibility for students to understand and critically examine the world around them.  While looking at the results of the study in relation to critical literacy as defined by Janks (2013), it becomes clear that fiction offers a socially critical viewpoint where students can critically analyze the world around them through the literature and the different types of tasks associated with it. In the conclusion of this paper, limitations are presented and questions are posed to hopefully be further explored in the future.