Bildung, Motivation, and Deliberative Democracy in Primary Education

Abstract

Our intention with this chapter is to argue for connections between the broad framework of “Bildung”, which is central to Danish educational thinking because it applies to education for deliberative democratic citizenship and the concept of motives as it has been developed in Cultural-Historical Psychology. The central tenet in the present chapter is to argue that education for deliberative democratic citizenship must be connected to, but cannot be reduced to, children’s everyday experience in and beyond school. Though seemingly self-apparent, this idea is challenged both from more formalistic approaches that foreground factual knowledge and, specifically in Denmark, a reduced emphasis of democracy as a potential fundamental aspect of school practice. The concept of motive is utilized to capture the content-rich and directed interests of students concerning the discovery of mutual differences in everyday school practice. Empirical material from classrooms is used to show connections and disconnections between the students and teachers in everyday school life vis-a-vis students’ explorations of their own and others’ religious beliefs and practices.