The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child includes children's right to participation in processes that affect them. In this article we caution that in order to give real content to participation, it is necessary to understand what participation is and to acknowledge the problematic nature of the concept. We then demonstrate, by…

Reliance on quantitative work has led to understudy of the "underlife" of the classroom. We observed six 11th and 12th grade history and government classrooms, twice a week, for a semester in order to explore whether and how teachers express their personal opinions, permit students to express their opinions, discuss political participation, and…

Using a questionnaire of 60 cognitive items, the general knowledge of Canadian students in grades 7, 10, and 12 about the Canadian political process was assessed. Results from the test's administration to 14,051 French and English students indicate that the subjects possess an adequate level of knowledge about Canada. (TJH)