Education towards democracy : implementation of democratic methods in primary school classrooms in Norway

Abstract

The broad purpose of this project is to accumulate knowledge of the role of democracy in one Norwegian primary school and assess the importance of this approach for contemporary society. My goal is to carry out a case study and analyze how and why democratic methods are being implemented at a primary school level. My scientific aim is to find out more about how ideas of democracy make their way to children. Thus, the research question is: How are democratic methods implemented in the primary school classroom in Nyskolen situated in the capital area of Norway?A literature review on different academic resources, including The Norwegian National Curriculum (2019), were used to construct a framework for the case study. According to the newest changes in this official document, the educational authorities have to monitor how well the schools adjust their local curricula to the new requirements towards sustainability, democracy and cultural diversity. A special place is assigned to the importance of practicing democracy on a daily basis. Data-gathering visits to the school were made from June 2019 until the middle of October 2019. I took in-depth interviews with the principal and four primary school teachers. These tutors are qualified, according to the Norwegian legislation, to teach students from first and up to the tenth grade.The most immediate way for the teachers to channel democracy directly and on a regular basis to their pupils is through dialogical teaching. This form of teaching appears to be the necessary foundation for other democratic teaching in the classroom, as for example problem-solving and using an interdisciplinary approach. More teachers well acquainted with the dialogic teaching are needed. Also, political will is necessary in order to investigate how democracy can be implemented in education on a national basis and support schools and teachers to move in that direction. The existence of Nyskolen shows that to be successful democratic teaching needs to be well thought out as a working concept and as an ideology, and in order to cover all the aspects of the school day.This study shows how democratic methods of teaching could be applied to existing schools. This becomes fundamental with the new Norwegian National Curriculum (2019), which posits democracy as one of six educational values that have to be followed whenever the primary school teachers make plans for teaching.