International perspectives on values and status representation in K-12 education

Session Submission Type: Group Panel

Description of Session

The goal of this panel is to examine the ways in which curriculum and the educational working environment contribute to students’ and teachers’ values. The first paper will investigate cross-national factors of school environment that may have strong or weak relationships with the status representation of the lower-secondary teaching profession. This research will highlight the essential variables of the working environment that impact the social value of teaching, which should be considered as desirable school environment. The second paper will focus on the integration of peace education into the Ghana Education Service’s lower-secondary school social studies syllabi. The paper seeks to explore the changes that were made to the 2008 syllabi and determine if these changes may be effective in promoting peace within Ghana. The third paper considers trends in gender representation in primary-level language textbooks in Afghanistan prior to the 1978 civil war and following the 2001 collapse of the Taliban regime. This paper looks also at the influence of national and international forces on the promotion of gender equality in the textbooks. Finally, the fourth paper examines three sex education programs in the Netherlands, Nigeria, and the United States to determine the ways in which the curricula seek to change students’ attitudes about critical value issues like gender equity, discrimination, and the right to bodily integrity.

This panel recognizes the important role that education and environment play in promoting and shaping values and therefore seeks to analyze the various inputs at work. The first paper, a quantitative study, examines OECD’s Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) and focuses on certain variables that are included in the survey, such as teacher gender ratio, teachers’ working hours, and the teacher-principal relationship. The remaining three papers utilize qualitative methods, including the use of emergent and pre-existing codes, to analyze a variety of sources for data such as lower-secondary school syllabi, primary school language textbooks, and sex education curricula designed for lower- and upper-secondary school students. The papers on teachers’ status and sex education curricula are both cross-national, while the papers on the integration of peace education into syllabi and gender representation in textbooks are single-country studies.

The papers utilize a number of different theories to support their methods and analyses. The quantitative study on social value of teaching is framed by motivator-hygiene theory. The qualitative study on lower-secondary school syllabi uses peace education theory to challenge Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of reproduction. World society theory and cultural globalization theory support the qualitative study on gender representation in textbooks. Lastly, the qualitative study on sex education curricula is framed by transformative learning theory and social meliorism theory. The papers look to curricula, syllabi, and OECD data to provide international perspectives on values and status in education.

Sub Unit

• General Pool

Chair

• Taryn Moore, Stanford University

Individual Presentations

• The integration of peace education into the Ghana Education Service’s junior secondary school social studies syllabi - Najwa Yasmeen Webster, Stanford University

• Gender representation in the Afghan textbooks and policies: Promise or progress? - Somaye Sarvarzade, Stanford University

• Let’s talk about sex: Exploring sex education curricula in the Netherlands, Nigeria, and the United States - Taryn Moore, Stanford University