Religious studies should give students the opportunity to reflect over life questions. Religious studies give students the opportunity to reflect over their identity and ethical approach. Reflecting over life and questions about life in the classroom have become a central part of religion education. This interview study investigates how six legitimized high school teachers teach about death. The teachers explain what teaching methods they use and what difficulties and problems they encounter while teaching students about death. Previous studies have demonstrated that kids prefer discussing the philosophy of life. The purpose of this of the study is to search how teachers in high school educate their students on death, what kind of relationship the students have to death and what kind of difficulties they encounter with in practice. The study Is based on a qualitative approach that has a semi-structured interview method. In the results the teachers responses are presented within four themes which are analyzed with a pragmatism theory and previous research. The end results proved that the teachers had various and different thoughts on educating about death and life and that they all used different ways of working.

The aim of the thesis was to study young people's thoughts on religious education in high school with a focus on life questions (livsfrågor). In order to achieve the purpose of the thesis the issue was divided into two primary issues: how do young people describe religious education in high school? And how do they reflect on the concept of life questions? And two secondary issues: do young people consider that life questions were a part of religious teaching? And do the young people consider that their life questions were a part of religious teaching? In order to answer the issues five young people were interviewed on questions related to teaching of religion and life questions. The five youths had studied at least one religious course at secondary level. The results showed that the five youths regarded religious education as studies about "the others" because the major focus was on facts but they nevertheless perceived religious education as interesting. All the young people reflected differently about the concept of life questions. Whether or not life questions were brought up in the classrooms varied between the participants. Only one of the participants expressed with certainty that life questions that she also viewed as her own were brought up in the classroom.

This paper aims to describe how religion teachers in Swedish schools teach concerning questions about life issues and popular culture. To research the teachers' didactic approach to these issues, didactics has been defined with three educational questions: what, how and why. The essay focuses on teachers' effective implementation of teaching on life issues and popular culture, which we used a theory of offering meaningfulness describing what subject matter that may be imparted to the students. An offer of meaningfulness can be pursued and can be made visible in the context of what and how performs the teaching and also in the context where the teacher planned the teaching elements. The method that the paper has used is the interviews of four different active religious educators in Stockholm and Uppsala area. These interviews were conducted at every teacher’s workplace. The interviews were recorded and we used a semi- structured interview guide, which has been created to ensure that the important issues for the survey answered. The results show that religion teachers are experiencing a shortage of time, when planning the teaching elements of life issues teaching on life issues and popular culture. The results also show that when students receive instructions in the subjects concerning life issues and popular culture, it is usually in relation to the other world religions. In the discussion, our results were partially consistent with previous studies in the field of life issues and popular culture. The interviewed teachers created different offer of meaningfulness that the students could impart in their creation of answers to the questions of life.

The aim of this study is to investigate where young people in Sweden encounter life questions in a country that is secularized and where many struggle with their mental health. The study also investigates what impact this encounter with life questions has to young peoples mental health. Lastly the study discusses what space this subject gets in the Swedish religious education. In order to answer the questions this study is about; interviews were held with six different students of high school education in Sweden. They were interviewed about where they encounter life questions and they also got questions about where they search for answers and explanations to their life questions. No student had a religious background, but they did in some instances believe there is something bigger in the world. Something that can give them purpose to what happens after death or give them some sort of deeper meaning to life to cope with their life questions that they do not find answers to. The interviewed students then got to reflect about how their search for answers affect their mental wellbeing in a time when many young people in Sweden struggle with their mental health. They also got to reflect about if schools could have taught them more about how to cope with difficult life questions and if they needed more time to work with these skills. The results showed that young people in Sweden are affected by their search for answers to their life questions. It seems that few has gotten the skills they need to cope with life questions that has no clear answers and that seems also to be a reason to young peoples struggle with their mental health in Sweden.

The thesis contributes to the research field of education, or more specific to the field of religious education. The aim of the thesis is to interpret how young adults of today describe and understand their lives, with a specific focus on existential themes, and furthermore, to develop useful concepts that can help us understand individual meaning-making in a social and cultural context. The meaning-making of young people and how they explore and develop their understanding is, in the thesis, seen both as an individual process and at the same time something socially shared. The theoretical understanding of the social context takes its point of departure in Berger and Luckmann’s theory about the social construction of reality. The methodological approach is empirical and the study is based on 21 deep-interviews with men and women between 19-29 years old. Their statements are analyzed using a hermeneutic - interpretive method. The thesis gives a picture of the young adults’ understanding of death and the meaning of life. But the study also addresses vital existential themes for the young adults around the questions: who am I, what do I want to choose and where am I heading. Still another important theme is insecurity. One important contribution of the thesis is the development of new concepts that describe the young adults’ understanding of their lives, in terms of personal and shared configurations. In the material I have seen three different kinds of shared configurations and I speak of those in terms of: life-views, taken for granted perspectives and institutions. The dynamics that the personal configurations give examples of can be understood both in light of the shared configurations but also in light of the personal agency that the young adults show signs of.

This bachelor's thesis examines three books in the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. The aim is to increase understanding for what Harry Potter could contribute in terms of morality in religious studies, and how the story about Harry Potter, as a popular literary phenomenon, can be helpful for this. Lawrence Kohlberg's theory of moral development is central to this essay. I have used an hermeneutic method for the analysis of the Harry Potter books. The result shows that the main character, Harry Potter, can be seen as kind of a role model when it comes to moral development. Pupils may benefit by reading this book series because it can open their eyes to life questions and moral values. Identity formation, loyalty and fellowship are issues that the reader will be able to recognize and relate to in the Harry Potter books. Therefore it is relevant to use the Harry Potter books in teaching of religion. Life questions and moral values are also stressed in the syllabus for religious studies in junior high school. Furthermore the character Harry Potter does follow the moral development theory developed by Kohlberg, though it seems like the various stages are not separated, but rather integrated with each other. Harry Potter changes both intellectually and emotionally according to the magical world of Hogwarts school of wizardry and witchcraft.

The purpose of this study is to determine to which extent discourses identified within Swedish religious education also exists within the journal Religion & Livsfrågor [eng: Religion & Life Questions]. To what extent does the journal confirm their existence, are they problematized, and is there any way to avoid them? Previous research include mainly doctoral theses about discourses within the religious education in Sweden, as well as some research regarding the formation of the academic discipline didactics of religion. This study also relies on one particular study in didactics when choosing the material. The theoretical approach is based on previous research by Karin Kittelmann Flensner. She finds that there exist three discourses within religious education in contemporary Sweden: one secularist discourse, one spiritual discourse and one Swedishness discourse. A total of 28 numbers of Religion & Livsfrågor has been analyzed by applying the previously mentioned discourses onto the material. Findings indicate that these discourses also exist within the journal. Sometimes the discourses are problematized, but there are seldom any advices on how to avoid them. It also seems that these discourses existed both before and after Kittelmann Flensner’s study, which seem to indicate that the progress made in academic research aren’t always applied in schools. One way to give the teachers the opportunity to avoid these discourses would be to raise awareness regarding them.

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