This article explores the relationship between the philosophy of ethics, history education, and young people's historical ethical judgments. In the last two decades, "ethical judgments," which focus on making decisions about the ethics of historical actions, has been acknowledged as a second-order historical thinking concept in history…

For social work educators, teaching social policy in the current political climate in the United States may seem daunting and energizing at the same time. Students are often acutely aware of the political and policy-related controversies raging in Washington, D.C. and local governments, and yet their position on these issues may be unexplored or…

The dramatic increase in hate-related bullying and culturally and/or racially offensive comments or symbols in the wake of the 2016 election came as a surprise for many educators across the United States. Research points to both an increase in frequency of hate related speech and controversy in schools, and teachers reporting a lack of training,…

Teachers, both of science and of religion, have to help pupils to learn about the links between these subjects. An effective way to support this learning should start from the beliefs and ideas that pupils already have, ideas which might well be influenced by public debates, often characterised by controversy, between those holding strong beliefs…

Lisa Borgerding's work highlights how students can understand evolution without necessarily committing to it, and how learners may come to see it as one available way of thinking amongst others. This is presented as something that should be considered a successful outcome when teaching about material that many students may find incompatible with…

This study explored the interplay between science teachers' pedagogical beliefs, scientific evidence, and diversity. This study adopts a sociocultural view of science that views science as a cultural way of knowing, and acknowledges that it is laden with cultural understandings, interpretations, and a language of its own. This paper reports…

This article recounts our efforts as three critical teacher educators to respond to the postelection aftermath at an Hispanic-serving institution by organizing a conference aimed at re(engaging) our students in the kinds of critical conversations we deem essential to the profession. By considering the ways in which neoliberal ideology has shaped…

Discussions surrounding ideology and free speech on college and university campuses continually occur in the popular press. In this forum, Herbeck (see EJ1171161) chronicles several heated clashes over free speech that have recently erupted on campuses across the country, fueling news stories reported through traditional and social media. Issues…

In this article Kerry Apps introduces students to the significance of the witch-hunts in the modern era, at the time when they occurred, and in the middle of the eighteenth century. She presents her rationale for choosing the witch-hunts as a focus for the study of significance, and shows how her thinking about her teaching has evolved through her…

It's indisputable: disinformation, hoaxes, propaganda, and hyper-partisanship are increasingly global phenomena. Educators, librarians, policymakers, and community leaders are wondering about the implications of the changing information landscape. Anyone can publish and promote anything, and increasing political polarization is being combined with…

In an educational environment where interest in Arabic and Islam is growing, I ask the place of revisionist/critical approaches to early Islam in Higher Education. This paper uses 15 semi-structured interviews with Lecturers in early Islam to investigate how they treat controversial subject matter in the classroom. The paper examines how the…

Teaching controversial issues can be challenging for any teacher, but especially so when the teacher is a cultural outsider. In this article, we provide a snapshot of one social studies educator's experiences teaching about two hotly contested elections--the 2016 U.S. presidential election and the 2017 Korean special election--to middle school…

Recognizing the need to prepare elementary education teacher-candidates to implement state-mandated curriculum, a Genocide Studies Unit was developed. This study evaluated the effectiveness of the Unit in building preservice teachers' knowledge-base and efficacy levels with a mind toward preparing teachers to implement difficult content more…

The present empirical study seeks to explore the perceptions novice educators have toward the use of controversial public issues (CPI) in the secondary classroom. The research attempts to do this by examining the following research questions: (a) To what extent do new teachers associate the use of CPI in the classroom with broad principles of…

Engel, S. [2011. "Children's Need to Know: Curiosity in Schools." "Harvard Educational Review" 81 (4): 625-645] stated that curiosity should be cultivated in our schools as it is intrinsic to children's development. However, this is often absent from classrooms. In this paper we aim to explore some of the factors that have led…