Religious Reading in a Secular Society: Learning for Life in a Liberal Democracy?

《泰晤士报教育副刊》最近以“基督教学校未能通过宽容测试”为标题，声称在Ofsted检查的福音派基督教学校接受教育的儿童没有得到帮助，无法欣赏自己和其他文化。学校是否培养孩子成为好公民和宽容他人是一个重要的问题，这种学习的一些最重要的背景是艺术和人文课程。儿童在阅读和回应课文的过程中形成了价值观和世界观。本研究旨在调查艺术和人文课程中的阅读，以了解教师和学校如何寻求塑造年轻读者的反应和价值观。本研究将在一些不同的学校收集数据，并将寻求确定神学和教育对学校教师和福音派领袖的影响。基督教学校。主要研究者在学校的大部分时间将用于在唐卡斯特的Trinity学院进行人文和艺术课程的阅读案例研究。每半学期将在这所学校花两天时间观察9年级14岁学生的课程。每所学校的既定目标将与课堂上发生的事情进行比较。DVD和数字音频记录，转录和分析的课堂话语将提供一个很好的证据基础，从回答研究问题的程度，宗教价值观告知阅读。将对访谈（与青少年、教师、高级管理人员和赞助者）进行分析，以确定宗教观点在艺术和人文课程的教学和学习中表现明显的方式。将对文件、库存清单和工作计划进行分析和比较，以便在访谈期间以及通过观察和调查表分析，探讨文本选择、审查和作出这些决定的理由。访谈分析将是定性和专题的。为了比较的目的，数据将收集在其他9所基督教学校，特别是：2个进一步ESF学校也由彼得·瓦迪爵士赞助，以及4个最大的CST（基督教学校信托）学校和3所学校在欧洲，有链接到这些基督教学校。观察的课程不会随机选择，但这些课程将被选择用于观察教师认为最有特色的课程，并在课堂上展示他们学校的价值观，目标和使命。换句话说，将选择被认为尽可能不同于非信仰学校的课程进行观察和数据收集。如果一个教师认为一个特定的基于文本的课程或课程序列提供了他或她认为是“信仰学习整合”的例子，这些将被观察到。首席研究员会以客座教师兼研究员的身份，在每所到访的学校教授相同的“便携式”文/文科课本，以便比较不同学校青少年的反应。这10节课的记录和誊写将提供独特的比较数据。学校的教师还将保留“信仰和价值观”期刊，记录他们在课程中对信仰和学习的任何感知融合，这些期刊将为采访和观察提供信息。当一所信仰学校的教师接受采访时，他们将被要求对其他信仰学校收集的数据（DVD录音）发表评论。这10所学校的部分课程录音将向县和教会学校的教师展示，以便于分析异同。通过这种方式，可以确定阅读在不同背景下对公民身份的贡献。

The Times Educational Supplement recently carried the headline 'Christian Schools Fail Test of Tolerance' claiming that children educated in evangelical Christian schools inspected by Ofsted were not helped to acquire an appreciation of their own and other cultures. Whether schools prepare children to be good citizens and to be tolerant of others is an important issue and some of the most significant contexts for such learning are arts and humanities lessons. As children develop values and worldviews while they are reading and responding to texts this research proposes to investigate such reading in arts and humanities lessons to find out how teachers and schools seek to the shape the responses and values of young readers.Data is to be collected in a number of different schools and the project will seek to ascertain the theological and educational influences upon schoolteachers and leaders in evangelical Christian schools. The bulk of the Principal Investigator's time in schools will be devoted to undertaking a case study of reading in humanities and arts lessons at Trinity Academy, Doncaster. Two days will be spent in this school each half term observing the lessons of fourteen year old pupils in Year 9. Each school's stated aims will be compared with what happens in lessons. DVD and digital audio recording, transcription and analysis of situated classroom discourse will provide a good evidence base from which to answer research questions about the degree to which religious values inform reading. Interviews (with adolescents, teachers, senior managers and sponsors) will be analysed to establish the ways in which religious perspectives are evident in teaching and learning in the arts and humanities lessons. Documentation, stock lists and schemes of work will be analysed and compared so that text choice, censorship and the rationale for such decisions can be explored during interviews and through observations and questionnaire analysis. Analysis of interviews will be qualitative and thematic. For comparative purposes, data will be collected in 9 other Christian schools, specifically: 2 further ESF schools also sponsored by Sir Peter Vardy as well as 4 of the largest CST (Christian Schools Trust) schools and 3 schools in Europe that have links to these Christian schools. Lessons observed will not be selected randomly but those lessons will be chosen for observation that teachers consider to be most distinctive and to demonstrate the values, aims and mission of their school in the classroom. In other words, lessons will be selected for observation and data collection that are perceived to be as different as possible to those occurring in non-faith schools. If a teacher believes a particular text-based lesson or sequence of lessons offers what he or she considers to be an example of 'faith-learning integration' these will be observed. In each school visited the Principal Investigator will, as a visiting teacher-researcher, teach the same 'portable' text-based arts/humanities lesson so that the responses of adolescents in different schools can be compared. Recording and transcription of these 10 lessons will provide unique comparative data. Teachers in the schools will also keep 'faith and values' journals, recording any perceived integration of faith and learning in their lessons and these journals will inform interviews and observation. When teachers in one faith school are interviewed they will be asked to comment on data (DVD recordings) collected in other faith schools. Selected recordings of lessons in these 10 schools will be shown to teachers from county and church schools to facilitate analysis of similarities and differences. In this way the contribution of reading to citizenship in different contexts can be established.