In this brief essay, I respond to four critics of my most recent book, "Teaching Honesty in a Populist Era: Emphasizing Truth in the Education of Citizens" (Oxford University Press, 2024). I attend to their concerns regarding who is included in the "we" of the fundamental civic question, "What should we do?" That…

This study investigates the effectiveness of two pedagogical strategies--deliberation and debate--in fostering productive political discussions among high school students, with a focus on overcoming affective polarization. Paying attention to students' comfort, engagement, and willingness to participate, this study employs a mixed-method approach…

It has been well established that controversial issue discussions are an integral component to a high-quality civic education. However, as the United States has become increasingly politically polarized, teachers have become more hesitant to engage students in discussions of controversial political issues. Two decades worth of literature on…

Purpose: This study investigates teachers' professional judgement about Russia's war on Ukraine as an unplanned, controversial classroom issue. Design: It employs 26 interviews with Russian teachers collected during the invasion's first month. Findings: The analysis identifies six situations and five teaching approaches that emerged in response to…

This chapter focuses on effective preparation for civic reasoning, discourse, and problem solving. It reviews literatures, including major synthetic reviews and studies from the science of learning and development (SoLD), civics education, and mathematics education. Based on these reviews, the authors make the case for a more comprehensive form of…

Political dissent has played an important role in giving U.S. citizens a voice and promoting justice for all. But too often, Sarah Stitzlein argues, dissent is underappreciated, especially in schools. Stitzlein discusses the obstacles to teaching dissent, particularly political movements seeking to suppress curricula and ideas that are considered…

The school shooting in Parkland, Fla., in February 2018 led many students to engage in walkouts and other protests during the school day. Some schools supported their actions, while others disciplined students who participated. Alan Singer considers these schools' responses and explains that the social studies standards in many states encourage…

With nationwide concerns about the declines in youth voting turnout across the United States, increased attention has focused on schools to promote "civic education," a broad curricular approach aimed at facilitating students' development of key civic knowledge, skills, and behaviors. However, less is known about how civic education…

Purpose: Many argue for the benefits of controversial political issues (CPI) discussions but little is known about teachers', parents', and students' attitudes toward CPI. The present study explored these attitudes, as well as attitudes towards specific controversial topics, and how they relate to socio-demographic variables.…

Although civic education has experienced a significant revitalization during the past two decades, America's high schools are not adequately preparing young people for self-governance and civic participation. While an estimated 90 percent of American high school students take a Civics or American Government course, a majority of graduates are…

Currently, a knowledge gap exists at the intersection of immigration, citizenship, and education. We have little knowledge of how teachers teach about citizenship when they anticipate that some of their students are undocumented. Conceptually, we distinguish between formal and cultural citizenship and draw from immigrant political incorporation…

Being challenged by opposing views in a controversial discussion can stimulate the production of more elaborate and sophisticated argumentations. According to the model of argument reappraisal (Leitão, 2000), such processes require transactivity, meaning that students do not only give reasons to support their own position (e.g., pro/contra…

As the American public starts to focus on the 2016 election, questions about whether "young people" (generally people who are under 30) really know enough to vote, and whether they will vote, often dominate the media discussion. It's important to know the answers to these questions because they affect our democracy. Young people have…

Civic education is considered as a way to nurture good citizens who work to develop the polity. However, in real politics, education often mirrors instead of shaping the political development. Reviewing civic education of Hong Kong from a historical development perspective, this article explains that civic education has for long been used a tool…

Political divides in our democracy are ever-widening. Deliberative democratic civics education provides a new way for civics education to prepare students for a democracy that addresses the diversity in moral perspectives that have created the divides in a more constructive way. Civics education traditionally has been tied to aggregative theories…