Narthical religious learning: redefining religious education in terms of pilgrimage

Religious education at school should be more than just the acquisition of knowledge. It should not only provide cognitive facts on how religious people act according to their moral and religious convictions, but also on how learners can gain as much profit as possible from these facts in order to build their own identity as religious ‘tourists’. Good religious education challenges them also to become ‘pilgrims’ and to allow the ‘slow questions’ of religion to enter into their own life, in all their vulnerability and provisionality. This paper discusses the recent orientation towards religious experience in religious didactics in Western Europe and makes out a case for a mystagogical‐communicative or ‘narthical’ approach to religious learning. This argument is presented against the background of individualisation, pluralisation and detraditionalisation of religion, which is the typical context for young people in their search for meaning today.     

Critical religious education: highlighting religious truth-claims in non-confessional educational contexts

In this article, a religious education, which combines a respect for relevant critical demands, when analysing religious truth-claims, and a sensitivity to the need to avoid unwarranted criteriological constraints in the analysing process, is examined. Starting with an analytical comment upon Andrew Wright’s critical realist approach in terms of a ‘pursuit of truth’, the question of how to motivate epistemological analyses within religious education is raised and discussed with reference to three relevant sceptical arguments. These arguments are made objects of critical comments, and an illustration of pedagogical and methodological consequences is presented with reference to the new syllabuses for religious education in Sweden. Finally, a constructive re-interpretation of Wright’s approach is elaborated, and a critical position in relation to it is outlined.     

The other partition: religious and secular education in British Palestine

The recent critical turn toward post-secularism, particularly on behalf of theorists working from the perspective of Christian societies, has highlighted the difficulty of approaching the history of the Middle East through the binary of religion and secularism. This article argues that such terms are of little explanatory value in and of themselves, but rather must themselves be explained as unique historical objects. Through an analysis of the Arab public school system created by the government of Mandatory Palestine, this study demonstrates how the transformation of Islamic education occurred within a matrix of colonial domination that promoted its unique understanding of religion as a universal standard. By tracing the emergence of ‘religion’ as a distinct category of knowledge and human experience in modern Palestine, this article draws attention to the factors that distinguish the development of colonial secularism from phenomena observed in the Euro-American context.     

Teaching inclusive religious education impartially: an English perspective

The article draws on experience of teaching, teacher education and qualitative research related to an impartial approach to inclusive religious education (including pupils from families who identify with or do not identify with religion or belief groups), in publicly funded schools in England. Such religious education is considered to be intrinsically worthwhile and instrumentally important in contributing to pupils’ personal and social development. The approach considered is hermeneutical, bringing reliable information into relationship with knowledge and experience of pupils and teacher through active learning, including dialogue. Qualitative research on student and early career teachers suggests that appropriate skills and attitudes supporting an impartial approach can be developed, facilitating a relationship of trust between teacher and students. A condition is the development of teachers’ knowledge and understanding of the stances of pupils in their classes. However, some student teachers or teachers with very firmly held views find it very difficult to adopt an impartial approach. On the basis of examples from qualitative research, it is argued that good quality teacher education can assist in developing appropriate skills and attitudes for those wishing to take an impartial approach. Further research, ideally involving partnership between researchers and practitioners, is recommended.     

Towards integrative religious education in Belgium and Flanders: challenges and opportunities

This article describes the way in which religious education (RE) has been organised in Flanders and Belgium, and gives attention to the problems and challenges that arise these days. We argue that the Schoolpact of 1958 which implies separate RE in different religions in public schools needs a revision. Therefore, we propose an alternative system, within the boundaries of the Belgian constitution that makes room for integrative RE as a new compulsory school subject in all schools.     

Human rights education and religious education: from mutual suspicion to elective affinity

What are the prospects for joining religious education and human rights education? (1) Human rights educators may cite good historical and philosophical reasons for teaching about human rights without making any reference whatsoever to a religious foundation. (2) For their part, many religious communities have resisted opportunities to form alliances with human rights organisations, citing one form or another of ‘incommensurability’ between their faith and rights. (3) However, there also appear to be some occasions and some projects in which these two communities of discourse can embrace each other, and work for similar goals. How can we come to a better understanding about these regions of ‘elective affinity’ and their implications for religious education and human rights education?     

An alternative reading of modern religious education in England and Wales

This paper challenges the overly positive image of the contribution made by religious education in England and Wales to the attainment of liberal educational aims that was recently presented in this journal, in the context of a review symposium on a festschrift celebrating the work and achievements of the influential British religious educator, Professor John Hull. An alternative reading is pursued that provides a more accurate and fair interpretation of the evidence. There is a discussion of the ideological character of British religious education and a consideration of the reasons why assertions of its ‘success’ by religious educators are currently so vocal. Critical attention is focused on two particular issues over which the influence of Hull on contemporary policy and practice is acknowledged: that of his dismissal of the accusation that multi‐faith religious education confuses pupils, and that of current strategies in religious education to promote inter‐religious and intercultural understanding.     

The challenge of religious education to deal with past and present Catholicism

Religious education (RE) in secondary schools in the Netherlands is challenged to redefine the educational aims. Concerning this debate, the preference for a cognitive approach is remarkably dominant, not only among scholars but among RE teachers as well. This appeal for a cognitive turn is based upon two hypotheses: first on the presumption of religious blankness among religiously unaffiliated pupils and second on a specific view on the way religious affiliation, religious reflectivity and religious tolerance are intertwined. The current article elaborates on a empirical research that questions both hypotheses. It first discovered the ongoing connection religiously unaffiliated pupils have with a former and conventional type of Catholicism, which impedes the development of their reflective personal religiosity as well as that of their interreligious openness. Second, this investigation revealed that personal connectedness with contemporary Catholic faith encourages these two developments. As such, this research contributes to a nuanced perspective on the chances and bottlenecks within religious learning by religiously unaffiliated and affiliated pupils. Concerning the redefinition of religious educational aims, it provides empirical arguments for a balanced combination of cognitive, attitudinal and experiential aims and advocates a preference for experiential and attitudinal aspects as a didactical starting point.     

Contextual religious education and the actuality of religions

Contextual religious educators tend to view discrete religious traditions as artificially constructed systems disconnected from the ordinary experiences of children. This article sets out the case for the continued representation of religions as substantial social facts in religious education classrooms. Accepting Robert Jackson’s critique of essentialist readings of religion, it argues that the most appropriate alternative is not the nominal reduction of discrete religious traditions to the atomistic level of the individual spiritual lives of adherents, but a realistic identification of such traditions as actual socio‐cultural realities. It suggests two criteria for such identification: the collective intentionality of adherents and the presence of prototypical features within their lifeworlds.     

Improving the pedagogy of Islamic religious education through an application of critical religious education,variation theory and the learning study model

This study presents a new theoretical and pedagogical framework based on the theories of Critical Religious Education (CRE), Variation Theory (VT) and the Learning Study model with the purpose of improving teaching and learning in Islamic Religious Education (IRE). It reports a Learning Study conducted in a secondary girls Muslim school in London on the topic of ‘Islam and being Muslim’. The aim of this research study is to examine if and how the proposed framework can be applied to IRE lessons, and how it affects the students’ learning. Thirty students of two seventh grade classes and their religious education teacher participated in the study. The data was collected through interviews and written tasks with the students before and after their participation in the study, video-recordings of the research lessons, and meetings with the teacher. Phenomenography and VT were utilised in the analysis of the data. The results suggest that the use of CRE, VT and Learning Study in teaching Islam contributes to students’ learning outcomes by means of helping teacher consider students’ diverse perspectives on religious phenomena when planning and implementing the curricular content, increasing students’ awareness of the ontological and epistemological dimensions of their faith as well as allowing them to make informed judgments about religious phenomena.     

Teaching Orthodox religious education on the border

In geographical areas bordering those of other states, the function of educational systems, as the means for states to foster their citizens, is challenged by ambiguities and tensions connected to intercultural experiences. In this article, I illustrate some of the findings from a project that studies religious education in four border areas around the Baltic Barents Sea, by bringing forward the case of a school teacher who teaches Orthodox religious education (ORE), in a town in Finland close to the border with Russia. Thus, the aim is to present and discuss ORE in Finland as well as to understand what implication the border situation can have on religious education.     

Autonomy and religious education: lessons from a six-year evaluation of an educational reform in an Israeli school network

This study investigated the tension that exists between promoting an educational agenda and practising an educational approach which emphasises autonomy within the framework of religious education. Our main thesis is that every educational deed contains a dialectical tension between endorsing an educational agenda and the promotion of autonomy. Moreover, this tension is not restricted to religious education. The intensity of such a conflict varies in accordance with the flexibility (or inflexibility) of the dogma, the conceptual cohesion of the educational agenda and the perceived importance of granting autonomy to students. The more cohesive and inflexible the educational agenda is, the greater the danger that autonomy will be discarded. The present research examined an educational reform implemented in the National-Religious School Network in Israel, which included the promotion of autonomy among principals, teachers and students. Conducted over a six-year period (2006–2012), the research employed both qualitative and quantitative methodologies and involved various stakeholders in the school network. The multifaceted picture that emerged of the relationship between educational autonomy and religious agenda is presented.     

Modes of learning in religious education

This article is a contribution to the discussion of learning processes in religious education (RE) classrooms. Sociocultural theories of learning, understood here as tool-mediated processes, are used in an analysis of three RE classroom conversations. The analysis focuses on the language tools that are used in conversations; how the tools mediate; the dynamics they create between pupils and teachers; and how new language tools are created and enrolled. The following three modes of learning are found: distancing, dynamic and expansive. These modes are collectively enacted by teachers and students in the context of the classroom. The article therefore argues that RE classrooms can best be understood as social practices, rather than sums of individual cognition. Empirically, religion is in the making in RE – in the shape of bits, pieces and processes. In the material, however, RE is an educational practice, not a religious practice.     

The necessity of historical inquiry in educational research: the case of religious education

This article explores the mixed fortunes of historical inquiry as a method in educational studies and exposes evidence for the neglect of this method in religious education research in particular. It argues that historical inquiry, as a counterpart to other research methods, can add depth and range to our understanding of education, including religious education, and can illuminate important longer‐term, broader and philosophical issues. The article also argues that many historical voices have remained silent in the existing historiography of religious education because such historiography is too generalised and too biased towards the development of national policy and curriculum and pedagogical theory. To address this limitation in educational research, this article promotes rigorous historical studies that are more substantially grounded in the appropriate historiographical literature and utilise a wide range of original primary sources. Finally, the article explores a specific example of the way in which a historical approach may be fruitfully applied to a particular contemporary debate concerning the nature and purpose of religious education.     

The experience of black African religious education trainee teachers training in England

This study addresses issues surrounding the recruitment and training of black African religious education teachers within the context of the government’s intention to make the teaching profession more representative of the wider community. In relation to this there is a strong emphasis in the Teacher Training Agency’s Qualifying to Teach on selection procedures which promote equality of opportunity and the recognition of individual training needs. The study is informed by the work of Sikes and Everington who have highlighted the place of religion and culture within the personal histories of religious education teachers. Black African members of two successive cohorts of PGCE students are tracked to identify their training needs in relation to their cultural and religious backgrounds. The data identifies four cultural and religious factors which impact on their training to teach religious education in the UK. Finally, as advised by the Carrington Report, recommendations are made for the practice of teacher educators.     

论教会幼儿教育对中国幼儿教育近代化的影响

在华的外国教会幼儿教育作为特定的历史产物,在新中国成立后结柬了它的历史命运.考察教会幼儿教育在中国的发展历程,分析其在中国幼儿教育近代化的过程中所起到的推动作用以及阻碍问题,探讨中国幼儿教育在近代化进程中对教会幼儿教育的突破有现实意义.     

Religious studies,religious education and the aims of education

This article interacts with a recent article by Denise Cush and Catherine Robinson in which they call for a new dialogue between religious studies in universities and religious education, and identify a number of developments in religious studies that have implications for the practice of religious education in schools. Cush and Robinson are representative of an influential body of opinion among religious educators that looks to religious studies for inspiration. It is argued that they, along with others, fail to appreciate the difference between the aims of religious studies and those of religious education and that this unrecognised difference leads them both to engage uncritically and superficially with the history of post-confessional religious education and to fail to recognise that the roots of some of the weaknesses in contemporary religious education can be traced to the influence of religious studies over it. Showing that religious education has (and is required to have) a different set of aims from religious studies (though some aims may be held in common) alerts us to its distinctive nature, and this in turn facilitates a clearer understanding of its role in schools, which can serve both to direct and to evaluate educational outcomes.     

The use of teaching materials in religious education in Sweden: a quantitative analysis of Swedish religious education teachers’ reported use of teaching materials in RE classrooms

Abstract

Recent studies show that religious education (RE) and various media outlets serve as increasingly important arenas for religious socialisation among Swedish youths. At the same time, it has been shown that media material, for example in the form of various news media, often make their way into RE classrooms to be used as materials alongside the more traditional textbooks. However, little quantitative research has been conducted in order to map RE teachers’ selection and use of materials in their classrooms, and what factors are involved in this selection. A nationally representative survey among 1292 RE teachers was conducted, and the results clearly show that textbooks are the most popular form of material, followed by pictures, sacred texts, documentaries, television news and news articles. Out of the relevant background variables, it was primarily school form, age, gender and religiosity that seemed to influence the teachers’ choices of material. The author concludes that familiarity with a certain form of material through personal experiences is a likely explanation for many of the correlations found and that further research is needed in order to explore the potential complexities that arise in the juxtaposition of classroom and media logics.