Education for democracy and democratic citizenship

Abstract

This chapter considers education for democracy and citizenship specifically from a transcurricular perspective. First, we look at the concepts of democracy, education for democracy, and democratic citizenship, here starting from John Dewey’s construction of school as a micro-society where students can develop into democratic citizens by practicing democracy at school. We then reflect on the idea of education for democracy in the context of crosscurricular and transcurricular teaching, which is closely related to the idea of democracy as “a way of living.” Finally, we provide some concrete examples that are based on our own developmental work in teacher education of how cross-and transcurricular teaching can be implemented in education for democracy.