Students Motivation for Social Studies – Existential Exploration or Critical Engagement

Young Learners’ Perceptions of Learning about Sexual and Gender-Based Harassment: The Struggle for Recognition in School

“…Results from the digital student survey reveals that students would like to learn more about sexual harassment and sexual violence that affects their generation. I do not contend that these results are universal, but rather that they portray contextual patterns which can be seen in relation to previous research conducted among social science students regarding how they are engaged and motivated by topics that concerns them directly or evoke emotions (Børhaug and Borgund, 2018). The sample is relatively modest (N = 111), which is a limitation, but the results are interesting in the sense that there are clear tendencies towards the fact that the students wanted to address sensitive issues in their own life-worlds.…”

“…This is a paradox, which can also be understood as an explanation of the results of the digital survey among social science students; teachers do not address harassment, rape among young peers and child sexual abuse to any great extent, and this is precisely why the young students would like to learn more about these issues. In light of previous research (Børhaug and Borgund, 2018;Goldschmidt-Gjerløw, 2019), the results from the digital survey and in tune with transformative human rights education (Lundy and Sainz, 2018), I would recommend that school staff, teachers, student teachers and teacher educators link teaching about these sensitive issues to young people's lives, because this can create engagement and motivation for learning, and perhaps most importantly, it can also enable them to protect themselves and others from unwanted sexual attention. Despite the fact that the teaching lessons and the role-plays were theoretically intended to promote empowerment and action-skills for facing harassment and defending both their own and others' rights (Jordet, 2020;Osler, 2016; United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner, 2011), the young learners rather expressed a form of powerlessness due to how sexual and gender-based harassment manifests itself in real life.…”

“…Therefore, I interpret both the results from the student survey and group-interviews as empirical material that portrays learners' wish to learn more about the variety of these sensitive topics related to gender and sexuality, and especially in relation to their life-worlds. This can be related to a recent interview-based study among 26 social science students in Norway in which the authors found that students are motivated by content that concerns them directly, involve ethical considerations or that evoke emotions (Børhaug and Borgund, 2018).…”

Proficiency Level and Challenges of Students in Disciplines and Ideas in the Social Sciences

“…However, these theories often involve complex concepts requiring the students' critical skills to comprehend and apply these intricacies (Mafrudin, 2023;Nind et al, 2019). Consequently, the students' engagement heavily depends on understanding social sciences' foundational concepts (Børhaug & Borgund, 2018). Students faced difficulties exploring and applying theoretical concepts to sociocultural, economic, and political conditions when their foundational understanding is inadequate (Swanson & Collins, 2019).…”