In this article, the authors relate how they decided to offer their fifth graders a one-day celebration in honor of Diwali, one of the most popular Hindu festivals in India, enjoyed by people of every religion. They combined learning about the tradition with Indian music and film, art-making, special foods, and dance performances. Their students…

Background: The role of gender has been a neglected issue in research on intellectual disability (ID). People with ID are generally treated as a homogenous group that are largely categorized by their level of ID. This study compared living conditions of women and men with ID and related the results to similarities and differences among the general…

Describes the activities of "Hans Christian Andersen Year" (l986) in Denmark. (EL)

Cold February weather and pancakes are a traditional pairing. Pancake Day began as a way to eat up the foods that were abstained from in Lent--traditionally meat, fat, eggs and dairy products. The best-known pancake event is The Pancake Day Race in Buckinghamshire, England, which has been run since 1445. This column describes pairs of books that…

Background/Context: Theorists of civil society often view civil society as a site for democratic education. Civil society is supposed to assist democratic practice by offering people contexts in which they practice promoting the common good. This article, following Nina Eliasoph's intervention, takes this to be a claim requiring ethnographic…

Education in European countries is subject to many competing demands which have an influence on the organisation and content of arts education. Increasing globalisation has brought both benefits and challenges, including those arising from increased international competition, migration and multiculturalism, advancements in technology and the…

Lately, there has been more effort by the Micmac Indians to recover the lost arts of chanting and singing, especially at the wake that is held when a person dies and at the feast of St. Anne, the grandmother saint of the Micmac Indians. (NQ)

Describes the celebration of death in Mexico and gives an alternative perspective from which to examine current U.S. attitudes and practices concerning death. Discusses the role that children play in the Todos Santos, or Day of the Dead, festival and the imagery and ceremonies of the festival. (LB)

The International Child Art Festival, sponsored by the International Child Art Foundation, was held September 9-12, 2003, on the National Mall in Washington, DC. The three-day event was a celebration of the creativity of youth around the world. This article briefly describes the highlights of the this festival.

This article offers an analysis of recent development in primary education, in particular the prevailing climate of performativity and new initiatives on creativity. Since 1989 education has been dominated by the performativity discourse accompanied by the obsession with evidence: of children's learning; of teachers' performance; and of student…

This workshop presentation offers an introduction to and suggestions for a multicultural approach to teaching through music experiences. Experiences presented include: (1) "Funga Alafia," a welcome song from Liberia; (2) "Under the Spreading Chestnut Tree," an American traditional game song; (3) a Japanese version of…

This is the first of a planned series of investigations of the media habits and other cultural activities of 3- to 8-year-old Swedish children. Diagrams show the percent of children who use the various media on an average day and the frequency of their participation in such activities as visits to the theater, museum, or library. The amount of…