A Review of “Nurturing Children's Spirituality: Christian Perspectives and Best Practices”

This study examined the considerations involved when parents of sixth‐ and eighth‐graders in Israeli religious state elementary schools choose a religious secondary school for their children. While academic achievement was an important factor in parental choice, as religious Jews the parents were also greatly concerned with die secondary school's religious level. By means of discriminantal analysis, our study attempted to distinguish between two groups of parents: those who stressed the institution's religious level as opposed to those who stressed its academic level. We found that more religious parents, parents who had studied in boarding schools, and parents of Western origin belonged to the first category. Parents of younger children, less religious parents, and some parents of Oriental origin belonged to the latter group. The article also treats variations in parental attitudes according to parental gender, religious and communal identification, and child's grade and gender.     

“Love and Rage” in the Classroom: Planting the Seeds of Community Empowerment

Although no one unified anarchist theory exists, educational approaches can be taken to support the full liberation of the self and the construction of an interconnected community that strives to rid itself of eco-sociocultural oppressions. An anarchist pedagogical approach could be one that is rooted in a love/rage unit of analysis occurring along a spectrum of various types of actions and contributions within a community. Anarchism as a violent destruction of the state is a stereotypical view that has perhaps led to its own early demise as a social movement. Anarchism that embraces adaptation through more inclusive forms of resistance, including a reconstruction for the K–12 classroom context, is one that stands a chance in evolving a society toward love, justice, and empowerment. This article explores those possibilities aiming for accessibility while still honoring core anarchist calls for strong, localized democratic participation and decision-making outside of permanent hierarchies.