Låg- och mellanstadielärares attityder till religionsundervisning : En enkätstudie om nivån på undervisningen i religionskunskap.

Sammanfattning: Religious education is one of the subjects that’s included in the Swedish schools’ curriculum. This means that religion will be taught in school, from a low age. The purpose is to deepen the students’ knowledge about the different world religions and the ethical and existential questions that exist in our society, not only in Sweden, but around the world. The curriculum believes that all pupils in school should gain insight into how other people’s living conditions are and that all people are equally valuable, even though there are people with different religious beliefs or different views of life.  Previous research has shown that religious education in school is a sensitive subject and some teachers are uncomfortable providing religious education due to its controversial nature. This studies aim is to investigate whether this is something common for primary and middle school teachers in Sweden. If that’s so, the aim is to do research about why teachers feel uncomfortable while having religious education. In this study two theories has been used, two theories are given to why teachers may feel uncomfortable while providing religious education. One of the theories said that teachers may feel uncomfortable since they feared that they would offend the students or the students families and/or if the teacher thought they didn’t had enough knowledge about the subject.  By using a web-based survey, the result showed that primary and middle school teachers in Sweden didn’t feel uncomfortable while having religious education, as the theories and previous research said. However, it did show that teachers spend more time educating the students about the world religions, rather than ethical and existential questions. The survey also showed that the primary and middle school teachers in Sweden teach about religion at an in-depth level, rather than on basic level.