This article articulates how a "grasp of practice" serves as a reasoning resource for inquiry and citizenship abilities associated with nature of science (NOS) understanding. Theoretically, this resource is elaborated through an overlapping concern with "practice" in two literatures, science studies and psychology of learning, bringing attention…

This article deals with the question what pedagogical and religious educational contributions have to offer to the debate on citizenship. Some historical background and theoretical conceptualisations of nowadays political focus on citizenship are described particularly focusing on the Dutch case. Explicit attention is given to the role of religion…

Of all levels of schooling, the high school receives by far the most criticism. There are continuous innovations recommended in journal articles, textbooks, and speeches at state/national conventions on ways to improve the secondary level of schooling. At one teacher education convention, the speaker was criticizing the American high school and…

The reality that no one wants to leave anyone behind is the one fact that everyone--educators, politicians, moms, dads and the media--can agree on. However, U.S. schools' narrowing focus on reading, math and science test scores may be putting this generation of learners even more at risk, according to some of the leading thinkers in society today.…

A growing body of literature on community gardening, watershed restoration, and similar "civic ecology" practices suggests avenues for integrating social and ecological outcomes in urban natural resources management. In this paper, we argue that an environmental education programme in which learning is situated in civic ecology practices…

The Council for Cultural Cooperation's project "Preparation for Life" proposes radical changes in school curricula to prepare children for the needs of the twenty-first century. One recommendation is that secondary schools help young people accept, preserve, and promote human values, democracy, and human rights. (JN)

Civic education is essential for sustaining constitutional democracy in the United States, a country with the world's oldest constitutional democracy with political institutions whose philosophical foundations serve as a model for aspiring peoples around the world. This task force paper involves a nation-wide discussion of civic education, what…

This publication outlines goals that a consensus of educators and lay persons consider important for K-12 citizenship and social studies education. In the 1981-82 school year, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) will conduct a third national survey of the citizenship and social studies achievements of 9-, 13-, and 17-year-olds.…

This paper argues that the standard approach to teaching the history of political thought does not serve the ultimate goals of political theory education, and that alternative approaches are needed to make the history of thought appropriate for undergraduates. A history of political thought for life ought to enhance a person's capacity to act as a…

Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) is an initiative that dates back to the early 1990s. Whilst policy statements at this time referred to ESD as a bringing together of environmental and development education, in the UK, as in most other industrialized countries, it has been the environmental agenda that has tended to dominate. In the UK,…

In this essay, Benjamin Baez and Susan Talburt analyze the U.S. Department of Education's Helping Your Child Series to consider how the government of children, families, and schools reflects a concern with two seemingly unrelated political objectives of neoliberal projects: creating responsible, self-reliant citizens and making schools more…

Background: In this paper a study of both subject "content" and governing "processes" in Swedish physical education is presented. The reason why an analysis of both content and processes is of special interest is that it makes it possible to understand the encounter between the institutional level and the practice of education.…

The general procedures used to develop educational objectives for the National Assessment of Educational Progress are outlined, as are the procedures used to develop citizenship objectives. Ten general objectives are stated: "show concern for the welfare and dignity of others"; "support rights and freedoms of all individuals";…

Fostering an ethic of active citizenship is typically a key goal for national service. However, national service advocates often assume that national service will act as civic education, paying insufficient attention to what this means and how different policy designs further or undermine different conceptions or aspects of citizenship. This paper…