As a settler colonial state, Canada has used education to advance colonialism in an effort to erase the experiences of Indigenous peoples. Today, education has a critical role to play in advancing the truth of our shared history just as it has played a role in enacting colonial practices and violence on Indigenous peoples. This action research…

Youth literature can be regarded as an important educational tool. However, controversial issues in youth literature become more prominent and the different opinions (internationally and individually) on such issues place the focus more on censorship. This article aims to provide an overview and analysis of the discourse on censorship in…

Evolution is often seen as a site of contestation within the school curriculum. The topic of evolution is therefore often considered to be 'controversial'. I first examine what is meant by 'controversial' and conclude that while, in an everyday sense, the topic of evolution can indeed be considered to be controversial, this term can mislead. A…

Australia achieved marriage equality in 2017, following a controversial and divisive postal survey which invited all Australians to 'vote' on whether same-sex couples should be allowed to marry. The 'No' campaign focused on the alleged negative impact of marriage equality on children's education. Scare-mongering television clips claimed that boys…

What are controversial issues? Who decides whether something is controversial, and how does it affect how a subject is taught whether a topic is presented as either controversial or not so? Although there has long been a lively debate within educational research on what criteria should be used to determine whether or not an issue is controversial,…

There has been a growing literature among philosophers of education on how to frame questions of moral controversy in the classroom. Through the application of hard moral cases that may be said to leave one 'morally dumbfounded', I take up Michael Hand's influential epistemic criterion and attempt to show why its monistic approach is too limited…

Just before his death in 1970, John Scopes claimed that his famous trial "had no other effect upon my family" than his sister Lela losing her teaching job in Paducah, Kentucky. He was wrong. My interviews with John Scopes's family members and descendants -- most of whom have never talked about their famous relative until now -- reveal…

How might cisgender teachers of color who identify as male problematize social norms connected to race and gender? What privileges, limitations, and possibilities may emerge from such a social location? This essay explores these questions by looking at a number of micro-decisions that I make in an introductory-level undergraduate class. By…

Citizens often face dilemmas where they need to make decisions that impact our lives and are related to science and religion. For example, genetic cloning, nuclear energy and climate change can potentially appeal to moral and religious values as well as scientific knowledge. The ability to coordinate knowledge and values in reaching justified…

Recommendations for teaching the nature of science (NOS) are grounded in a deficit view of students and/or the public--wherein people accept pseudoscientific claims, particularly about evolution, because they do not adequately understand what counts as being "scientific." Under the deficit view, correct views of science are defined by…

This article examines how scripts that circulate among culturally and theologically conservative Christian students, whether they are categorized as "born again," "Religious Right," "Christian Right," "nondenominational," "evangelical," or "fundamental," aim to prime students for the…

In other work I have argued that decisions about what to teach directively and what non-directively should be governed by an epistemic criterion. Trevor Cooling has recently advanced some objections to my defence and application of the epistemic criterion and proposed an alternative to it. Here I reply to his objections and comment on his proposed…

In practice, in the classroom, teachers are still faced with the issue of what to say to children if they believe that evolution conflicts with their own or other people's religious faith. When asked how they plan to respond, most teacher trainees and teachers respond that they will be a neutral chair and try to give children a balanced view.…

In this article, two teacher educators reflect on their experiences teaching a diversity course for preservice middle-school teachers. The first author is an African American male teacher educator, and the second author is a White female teacher educator. While the authors bring distinct experiences, backgrounds, and epistemologies to this work,…

This critical analysis examined research on evolution in the United States between the years 2000-2014, spanning early classroom implementation of the National Science Education Standards to current research findings. First, we sought to understand how the research literature published between 2000 and 2014 contributed to knowledge of evolution…