Teaching for citizenship in Lebanon: Teachers talk about the civics classroom

Learning active citizenship: conflicts between students’ conceptualisations of citizenship and classroom learning experiences in Lebanon

“…This form of rote learning, or reciting information as received, is quite typical in conflict-affected contexts and is occasioned by a number of variables including teachers' fears of critical thinking threatening government control (Weinstein, Freedman, and Hughson 2007), teachers' anxieties over passing official government examinations and perceptions of younger children being incapable of constructing their own understandings (Akar 2012). Memorisation does not require pre-existing knowledge, collaboration or self-reflection.…”

“…Furthermore, interviews with civics teachers (Akar 2012), open-ended surveys of 31 students in civics classes (Akar 2007) and a large-scale quantitative study on civics teachers and students (United Nations Development Programme, Ministry of Education and Higher Education, Lebanon, and Council for Development and Reconstruction, Lebanon 2008) consistently show that pedagogies in the civics classroom are predominantly geared towards students reciting -for assessment purposes -what is presented as the democratic way of living. The empirical field examining the applications and influences of learning and teaching citizenship in Lebanon totally lacks students' self-reports on their civics classroom learning experiences and how these experiences relate to their own constructs and developments of citizenship.…”

“…This assessment of a dogmatic textbook produced by an unstable government system led the majority of students to describe it as hypocritical. Regarding civics teachers' challenges in the classroom (Akar 2012), students raise this issue and make it a trigger for class debates that many teachers prefer to avoid.…”

Dialogic pedagogies in educational settings for active citizenship, social cohesion and peacebuilding in Lebanon

“…However, the dominant didactic learning and teaching practices in Lebanese schools (Shuayb, 2007), particularly civics (Akar, 2012(Akar, , 2014 and history (Abouchedid et al, 2002) classrooms, undermine the intention to engage learners in dialogic activities. In civics classrooms, where teachers and students most commonly address topical and sensitive issues, teachers often steer away from debates and discussions in fear of emotional repercussions (Akar, 2012). Also, following an intervention of providing civics teachers with learning mentors over a course of 16 months to support dialogic and collaborative approaches to learning, classroom pedagogy was still based on preparations for summative testing (Shuayb et al, 2011).…”

Ethnic conflicts in Lebanon

“…Једно од средстава либанске владе у борби против друштвених подела је програм "Националног и грађанског образовања" који се спроводи у основним шко-лама широм земље. Ипак, учитељи који спроводе овај програм имају низ тешкоћа услед укорењених међуетничких и међуконфесионалних тензија [23].…”