Social Literacy, Citizenship Education and the National Curriculum
James Arthur

page 3: to be responsible; and to have the right social attitudes. These social aims anticipated much of the current debate about 'commnita5ian education.' Many communitarian theorists believed that eh social order rests on people's interdependent and

Both Hargreaves' and Bentley's proposals for the school curriculum can be firmly located within the communitarian agenda for education...

page 28: Communitarian collectivism democratic service, collaboration altruism sense of community....
page 29: Communitarian citizens can be progressive or conservative, for they place great emphasis on putting aside personal interest for the sake of community. They seek to balance the social good of the community against the good of the individual. Communitarian citizenship education would emphasize the role, depending on the ideological perspective, of 'mediating' social institutions in addition to schools, in the belief that Society as a whole is educative. AT best, this would not restrict itself to the transmission of a set of social procedures, but in to strengthen the democratic and participative spirit within each individual. At worst, it could bec9me jamoritarian in approach, insisiting on the acceptance of the moral position of the majority in society. We would argue that it is tot he best ideal of the communitarian citizen that New Labour has an agenda which ist o produce a majority of citizens who w8ll express communitarian sentiments, int he same way that Thatcherism attempted to encourage citizens to feel at home in expressing libertarian sentiments. That communitarianism may be progressive or conservative (or perhaps both) is highlighted in the debates over the New Labor government's policies on education since the General Election of 1997." 29-30

_______________________________________________
9 pages with references to church

Page 2: Int he normative view children are persuaded of the moral force of acting socially through heir voluntary associations with others, both in their immediate circle, such as the family, and in the wider community, for example through membership of a church or club.



Front Matter:
James Arthur is professor of Education at Canterbury Christ Church University College and his work is located in the field of 'critical policy scholarship'


page "any school beginning to develop a model of service learning in the community needs forts to be clear about how it will construct is model. Will the school develop a model based upon:
- the community of the school?
- the community in the school?
or
-the schools in the the community?

What twill be the underlying purpose of service learning? Will the schools attempt to develop in pupils understanding that will result from :
- learning for service?
-learning about service?
or
-learning from service?

If curriculum developers in schools look tot he National Curriculum for answer to these questions what will they find? At the heart of the revised National Curriculum documents is the Statement of Values by the National //Forum for Values in Education and the Community. The statement uses the refrain 'On the basis of these values, we should'.... Although schools and teachers are assured that there is general agreement in society on these values, the 'we' of the statement is never identified. On the basis of these values it is the responsibility of schools to enable the development in pupils of the capacity to: 'understand the carry out our responsibilities as citizens'; 'refuse to support values or actions that may be harmful to individual communities'; promote participation int he democratic processes by all sectors of the community': and to 'contribute to, as we benefit from economic and cultural resources....7