This study represents the first German-wide investigation of Islamic theology and religious education students. We examined how these prospective multipliers approach Islam in a reform-oriented manner. It was also asked whether study motivation, representation by Islamic associations, segregation, value orientations, enemy images, as well as…

Through interviews with student participants and evidence submitted to earn digital badges, a number of indicators suggest that a religious school's digital badges can provide opportunity to strengthen religious identity. In particular, student interviews and evidence supplied for the completion of learning objectives for digital badges indicate…

Teacher attrition and shortages have become a challenge worldwide. These phenomena diminish when teachers feel satisfied with their job. This study aimed to examine the relationship between teachers' intrinsic motivations and job satisfaction in religious and secular schools. A questionnaire was administered to 759 teachers in the Israeli Jewish…

This article discusses the case study of a programme for Jewish and Palestinian educators in Israel and our initial insights into the outcome of the initiative. The programme aims to address racism, segregation, and prejudice and to support educators to teach culture and tradition in a more humanistic, inclusive, and critical way. To achieve this,…

With a fertility rate that nearly triples the national average and increased political power that accompanies demographic growth, Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) Jews in Israel are becoming an increasingly important piece of the country's diverse national mosaic. This raises economic concerns: Haredi women earn low wages, while most Haredi men do not…

In this article, we outline the development and validation of an instrument for the assessment of attitudes towards religious diversity. The instrument uses four parallel scales, which evaluate attitudes towards Muslims, Christians, Jews and towards Non-religious people. Each scale is subdivided into eight parallel profile types and tests for the…

This article sets up a dialogue between "auto"-referential (looking to self) and "allo"-referential (looking to the other) approaches to religious difference and applies these to education for inter religious understanding in Jewish schools. It begins by arguing that the multiculturalism of the 1980s and 1990s set up a duality…

The article examines state-supported religious education and its consequences for civic attitudes in Indonesia and Israel, two democracies that grant religion a prominent place in the public sphere, particularly in education. The comparison reveals that while in Indonesia the state was able to gradually introduce a secular curriculum in religious…

This study seeks to analyse the components that contribute to Special Religious Education (SRE) classes in government schools in Australia being considered as a "safe place" and the ways in which they facilitate an understanding of the students' own religious and cultural identity. Our research focuses on one of the small faiths,…

This article reports on a small scale study, examining the influence of parental faith belief on parental engagement with children's learning. The literature surrounding parental engagement and the impact of familial belief on children's outcomes is examined. It is clear from work in the US that familial faith belief has an impact; however, the…

This paper describes the process of designing a curriculum model for Bible teaching in UK Jewish secondary schools. This model was designed over the period 2008-2010 by a team of curriculum specialists from the Jewish Curriculum Partnership UK in collaboration with a group of teachers from Jewish secondary schools. The paper first outlines the…

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;…

This paper explores the experiences of secondary school students from religious backgrounds in Religious Education (RE). A total of 16 loosely structured, group, pair and individual interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of 34 school-age members of four religious communities: one Jewish and three Christian. The findings make a useful…

In Jewish primary schools, religious education is centred on the study of Torah. At Sinai, according to Jewish tradition, Moses received the Torah in two parts: a written tradition (Hebrew scripture) and an oral tradition. The oral tradition contained much scriptural "interpretation" known, in Hebrew, as midrash. Midrash continued to be…

This article is a revised version of the author's contribution to the 2006 meeting of the "International Seminar on Religious Education and Values" in Driebergen, the Netherlands and is concerned with the need for continuing discussion about the identity of religious education. The article begins by arguing that, despite current criticisms,…