The dynamic of how civic education is framed during turbulent periods is illuminated through analysis of three Hong Kong official civic education curriculum guidelines (1985, 1996, 2012). Guidelines are publicly available, officially sanctioned statements of purpose that have particular relevance for education professionals and are used around the world to characterize educational initiatives. Our focus is on guidelines written during periods in which there was colonial hegemony by the United Kingdom (1985), an attempt to promote liberal democracy by the Hong Kongese (1996), and an assertion of Chinese nationalism (2012). We argue that guidelines about civic education are similar across these times of political turbulence. There are shifts in the content of the guidelines, but fundamental differences are not made explicit. The documents are not aligned with a theoretical framework of colonialism, liberal democracy, or Chinese nationalism, but rather, they are pragmatically oriented. The guidelines are signifiers of attempts to achieve normative stability. Copyright © 2019 College and University Faculty Assembly of National Council for the Social Studies.

This paper provides a detailed account of an experiment with class meetings over three years in a mixed-age, upper elementary class. Children were offered opportunities to experience the democratic process. Findings shows that children working in groups could develop classroom conduct and learn ethics by example, but they were less tolerant with minority views.

This paper examines Alice Miel's ideas on social learning. According to the author, Miel perceives that the ultimate goal of schooling is the development of democratic behavior among children; hence, she stresses on the promotion of democracy and diversity in the elementary social studies classroom. The author points out that her work contributes to the development of the theory and practice of democratic social learning in elementary schools and is viewed as historical antecedent to research studies in this area.