John Bolton, BA(chs) year 3

Citizenship Education

What controversial issues might arise in the classroom,

and how might they be dealt with?

        This issue can be split into two discussions, and before either can be entered into, a brief examination of citizenship education would be helpful. Citizenship is a wide-reaching subject, embracing existing curricular topics as well as introducing new concepts. In autumn of 1998, Professor Bernard Crick produced the report of the Advisory Group on Citizenship, which can be regarded as something of a bible for educationalists studying this subject. For a definition of citizenship as a concept, there can be no higher authority to turn to than the Secretary of State for Education and Employment, David Blunkett;

It is essential that we do more to help young people develop a

full understanding of their roles and responsibilities as citizens

in a modern democracy, and to equip them better to deal with the

difficult moral and social questions that arise in their lives and in society. ()

        It is to these moral and social questions that we now turn our attention, since these are surely the controversial issues one might encounter in the classroom. But what are controversial issues? And how does one contextualise them – to whom are they controversial, and what do they pertain to? These questions will all be answered, as best they can be, presently.

        A logistical flaw of citizenship education is that where this kind of education is concerned, the curriculum tends to marginalise its status because it is non-examinable (Ahier and Ross (ed), 1995, p.170). When one considers that at secondary level many children might be doing as many as ten GCSEs, one has to wonder how important this exalted personal and social education lesson will be deemed. The result, according to Ahier and Ross, is that it is allowed limited time and resources. But let us imagine a fully comprehensive, all-embracing timetabled citizenship course. To all intents and purposes, and for the sake of argument, this provision is encompassing all of the desired aims outlined in the Crick Report;

                …children learning…self-confidence and socially and

morally responsible behaviour…becoming helpfully

involved in the life and concerns of their communities…

and how to make themselves effective in public life through knowledge, skills and values (Crick, 1998, 2.11, pp.11-13)

Let us consider some of the controversial issues the teacher might encounter in the teaching of this very controversial subject. The question of what constitutes a controversial issue is deceptively easy to answer. The Crick Report provides one definition,

                …an issue about which there is no one fixed or universally

held point of view. (1999, 10.2, p.56)

        The condition of any controversial issue is that by its very definition it will be contentious. Some individuals will not care about it one way or the other, while others will have decidedly strong views on the subject. A subject such as religion is one such educational hot potato. Jennie Lindon (1999, p.100) states that a 1991 circular from the Department for Education stated that religious education (RE) should not just be limited to information about different religions, but should “extend into wider areas of morality, including the different between right and wrong”. The teaching of religious education is a contentious issue. Jennie Lindon (1999, p.98) reminds us that the Education Act of 1988 made it a compulsory subject except for the parental right of withdrawal. Thus presented with these facts, we should have schools educating their children about morals, and the beliefs and ideas of different religions. But Audrey Osler (1995, p.4) makes the disconcerting statement that “European education systems have tended to remain monocultural”. She says that those schools who do provide a polycultural curriculum are those schools in regions affected significantly by immigration. It is worrying that more schools nation-wide are not providing education covering different religions and cultures.

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        The first exemplar controversial issue we shall consider is how a multicultural school might cover in its lessons a religious story. By multicultural, we will assume the school has children of different religious faiths, and the story we will consider will be that of Joseph and his eleven brothers. For a Church of England school no real discord will arise with teaching this Bible story. There is currently a theatre company touring the country with Andrew Lloyd Webber’s and Tim Rice’s musical ‘Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat’. It draws thousands of people to each venue, and I can personally ...

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