There is an increasing recognition today that young people need to have knowledge about religions and world views in order to live and work in diverse societies. What kind of 'maps' are they provided with through religious, values and ethics education? Does education address the challenging existential questions that children and adolescents ask about life and the world? This volume addresses different aspects of how existential questions have been dealt with in educational research. It especially draws attention to the Swedish research tradition of focusing on life questions and the interpretation of life in education, but with contemporary international research added. It also addresses issues of ethics education and discusses possible options for the future of existential questions as a resource for education.

This book unites and explores different approaches to understand and develop knowledge-based religious education. While the importance of methodological issues in RE is understood and acknowledged, the editors and contributors interrogate what kind of knowledge should be explored, how this knowledge is defined and what the consequences would be. Subsequently, the book focuses on the concept of powerful knowledge which transcends students' everyday experiences, and how it can be incorporated into the RE curriculum. Drawing together international research from RE teaching and learning, the book explores various paths to integrate a truly knowledge-based religious education. The book will appeal to students and scholars of religious education, sociology of education and the philosophy of religion.

This book analyzes the changes and shifts in religious education in Europe over the past 50 years. In a post-secular age, it has become increasingly difficult to make sharp distinctions between what is religious and non-religious, confessional and non-confessional. Reforms in religious education in Sweden in the 1960s appeared as part of a process of wider secular liberalization, giving more credence to the idea of absolute neutrality in religious education. However drastic shifts in society, culture and the European religious landscape raise the need for a reevaluation of the foundations of religious education. Drawing on a range of case studies from across Europe, this book will appeal to students and scholars of religious education as well as post-secular education more generally.

How to open up spaces to make education more meaningful? The concept of space can involve educational interactions, relationships, contents and other relevant aspects relating to this purpose. The book presents three perspectives to engage in opening up spaces. It empowers pupils, students, and teachers to develop as unique individuals, better relate to the communities and cultural traditions to which they belon, and to develop new visions, understandings, and ways of living. This volume is the result of the search of a number of educational professionals on how to open up spaces to make education more meaningful. The opened spaces involve educational interactions, relationships, contents and other relevant aspects relating to this purpose. The book presents three salient perspectives to engage in this envisioned path. It empowers pupils, students, and teachers to: Develop as unique individuals. This process includes engaging with personal feelings, developing a personal way of thinking and judging, and articulating one’s own voice in relation to others and the specific social context. Relate to the communities and cultural traditions to which they (want to) belong, and to interact with others who may belong to different cultural traditions. Develop new visions, understandings, and ways of living in order to lead a sustainable life within the potential of our eco-system, together with the myriads of other life forms on planet earth. These interconnected perspectives are elaborated in the domains of Bildung, worldview education, mathematics, physical sciences and language. The volume provides an inviting new perspective, which holds that students and teachers are already entangled in worldly tensions and issues, from the very start of their entering into education. Given this fact, it is a joint educational challenge to question and make sense of the complexities of today’s world. As such, the spaces that are elaborated in this publication are identified as spaces for praxis, by envisioning education as a means to actively improve ourselves and our contexts. The authors of this research compilation belong to the (network of the) combined research group Normative Professionalism / Life Orientation of the Utrecht University and the HU University of Applied Sciences Utrecht. They are all professionals who combine intensive involvement in educational practice with practice-oriented research.

Good Teachers for Tomorrow’s Schools explores purpose of education, values in education and talents in education to map foundational, pedagogical and practical aspects of good teaching. It provides valuable research-based perspectives for scholars, teacher candidates, teacher educators and professional teachers.

This book offers a variety of outlooks and perspectives on the constitutive values and formative norms of a society, reflected by discourses on ethical-political education. It also discusses conceptual and critical philosophical works combined with empirical studies. The book is divided into three parts: the first part describes contemporary youth’s tangible experience of and reflections on ethical-political issues, while the second part explores the potential powers and pitfalls of educational philosophies, old and new. The third part highlights cutting edge issues within the humanities and social sciences, and examines the prospects of a fruitful rethinking of ethical-political education in response to today’s pressing issues. By addressing current dilemmas with diligence and insight, the authors offer solid arguments for new theoretical and practical directions to promote philosophical clarification and advance research. Intended for students, teachers and researchers, the book provides fresh perspectives on the many facets of ethical-political education, and as such is a valuable contribution to educational research and debate.

During the 20 year history of the European Network for Religious Education through Contextual Approaches (ENRECA), several books have been published on the subject of Religious Education, from sociological, psychological or anthropological perspectives and always in the contextual settings of national educational frameworks and other specific culturally bound phenomena. Also, very often, an international comparative perspective was included. The shared goal was not so much to reflect on religion as such, and on its changing doctrines, institutions and prescriptions, but to try and understand religion in the specific European contexts of secularization and the plurality of life orientations, and to understand how religion becomes manifest in education in a variety of concrete policies and classroom practices, reflecting various social issues. This volume, marking the 20th anniversary of ENRECA, has a specific focus on the contextual dimension of time.