The integrated status of Social Studies in the Norwegian "Curriculum for Knowledge Promotion in Primary and Secondary Education and Training 2020" reflects an international educational trend pertaining to a movement from knowledge and traditional disciplinary thinking to generic skills, competence and boundary crossing. This article…

This qualitative study examined how a selected sample of 15 to 16 year-old Norwegian pupils experience Bildung (all-around development) and education in their schooling, and how those experiences are in coherence with the intended curriculum policy goals as stated in the latest Norwegian curriculum reform. Wolfgang Klafki's operationalisation of…

The purpose of this paper is to examine the complex relationships between educational policy and classroom practice. By employing a sociocultural perspective, we examine formulations inscribed in socio-material artifacts about what students should learn and how they should engage with knowledge. We explore how these formulations are mobilized in…

Critical thinking is an essential skill for life-long learning, and, given its increasing importance as a graduate attribute, it is vital to evaluate how educational systems can best improve students' critical thinking through their curricula and classroom practices. This study evaluates the differences in the critical thinking skills of students…

Play, games and sport are a part of the content of physical education (PE), and has been the subject of a longstanding debate among educators internationally and in Scandinavian countries. Play refers to something unstructured and free, while sport is a controlled and managed activity. Drawing on Skovbjerg`s (2021) play theory, this article…

In this article I contribute to the scholarly discussion on how minority religions and world-views could be represented in the RE subject of Norwegian primary and lower secondary school. I will focus on Islam since Islam is the largest and -- at the same time -- most debated minority religion in Norway. The starting-point of my analysis will be…

This paper investigates how Norwegian school principals prepared to carry out the LK20 reform process. The importance of school principals and middle-level leaders as enactors of change efforts results from their close ties to teachers and teacher classroom practices. This suggests that without negotiation and support from micro-policy actors,…

In 2017, a new core curriculum was implemented in Norwegian primary and secondary education, replacing the core curriculum from 1997. While the concept of "danning" is present in both curricula, its meaning and use seem to change. The concept of "danning" has a played a significant role in Norwegian society and educational…

Against the backdrop of curriculum reform in Norway, this article presents a study of teacher involvement and influence in national curriculum making through participation in official commentary processes. Education policy documents presented teacher involvement in the reform as essential to the legitimacy and ownership of the curriculum in…

This paper explores how digital competence and digital technology are addressed in Norwegian early childhood teacher education (ECTE). The aim is to provide a national overview of the ECTE institutions' programme and relevant course plans to identify how the preservice teachers are being prepared for their future professional life as digitally…

This study investigates how students and teachers perceive learning outcomes when employing an inquiry-based learning approach, and how this relates to two conflicting perspectives on teaching and learning in the Norwegian curriculum. The informants are strategically chosen from among Norwegian elementary schools that use the 'students as…

This article reports a local study of the presence of history as a subject in the kindergartens of Kristiansand, a municipality in southern Norway. There is no syllabus for history in the national curriculum; nevertheless, the research sought to find historical content in the kindergartens. The research method was informed by a precept of history…

Secondary school level quantum physics (QP) courses have recently been implemented in the national curricula of many countries. QP gives opportunities to acquaint students with more recent physics and its applications and to discuss aspects of the nature of science. Research has shown that QP is a challenging area for students. Because the…

The Norwegian 2006 national curriculum reform introduced elite sport as an upper secondary school subject. The purpose of this innovation was twofold. Firstly, it was a political move to oppose the national growth of private elite sport schools. Secondly, the new elite sport curriculum formalizes opportunities for students taking academic programs…

This article explores the degree of professional control over a profession's knowledge base and the extent to which this control, and the knowledge base itself, are challenged by various stakeholders' agendas when public authorities allow societal stakeholders to influence education programmes. The analysis is based on a politically-initiated…