Teaching controversial issues raises challenges for both teachers and school directors.


However, being able to discuss sensitive and controversial issues in a respectful way is a vital skill in a democratic culture.

Schools must be places where students feel safe to engage in debates with people who have different opinions. Through the careful management of discussions on controversial issues, schools can promote freedom of expression, as well as inclusion, tolerance, and human rights and prevent, or counter, the use of hate speech by students.

To achieve this, a school action plan on managing controversial issues – which provides staff training – should be adopted as a priority.
 


Facts & Figures

71% of teachers and school leaders surveyed agreed that it is very important that all students in their school express their views openly, even when their views might be controversial.[1]

In response to the question, ‘How valuable is the study of the Holocaust for primary children?’ 88% of teachers viewed Holocaust teaching to be either ‘worthwhile’ or ‘very valuable’ to the primary pupil, although only 48% had actually taught it.[2]
 


What are controversial issues?

Controversial issues are issues which arouse strong feelings and divide communities.

Issues like these can arise anywhere at any time. They vary from the local to the global – from minarets to climate change. They also vary from place to place, e.g., gay marriage is relatively uncontentious in some countries, but highly controversial in others. Some are long-standing controversies, e.g., the ‘Troubles’ in Northern Ireland, the Israel-Palestine conflict and the ‘Kurdish issue’ in Turkey; while others are more recent, e.g., refugees, violent extremism and transgender issues.

What all these issues have in common is that they are complex, not easily settled by appeal to evidence alone and highly emotive – so much so that people often have difficulty discussing them rationally.
 


Why is it important to address controversial issues at school?

While it might be tempting for schools to try to shy away from issues like these, this is neither beneficial nor practical.

Discussing controversial issues helps students with different backgrounds and lifestyles to learn to live and work together peacefully and respectfully. It encourages them to listen to each other and talk through their differences sensitively. It also challenges them to think critically about their own beliefs and values and gives them confidence and skills to express these publicly.

Talking through difficult issues together develops a number of important democratic competences, e.g., openness to other cultures and beliefs, analytical and critical thinking skills, flexibility and adaptability, and tolerance of ambiguity - all of which lie at the heart of the Council of Europe Reference Framework of Competences for Democratic Culture.

Handled well, it breaks down barriers and helps to defuse social tension between opposing groups, both in school and the wider community.

Exploring controversial issues has educational as well as personal and social benefits. Issues like these help to define some of the major social, political, economic and moral fault-lines in contemporary life and underpin academic learning in many school subjects.

The strongest argument for addressing controversial issues explicitly, however, is that, in practice, they simply cannot be avoided. If teachers do not raise these issues, their students will.
 

Through training in the teaching of controversial issues, I have found the courage to discuss openly with my students issues I thought I would never be able to do, e.g., about sexual abuse and the porn industry.”  Teacher, Iceland


What are the challenges?

The biggest challenge is creating a school ethos in which students genuinely feel they can speak openly about their concerns without fear of vilification or ridicule.

Creating such an ethos requires a whole-school approach. It includes among other things:

  • teachers having the confidence and skills to handle discussion of difficult issues in the classroom, e.g., knowing how to deal with their own prejudices and biases, protect vulnerable individuals and marginalised groups, present issues even-handedly, cope with a lack of expert knowledge, and handle spontaneous or unexpected questions and remarks constructively;
  • school leaders encouraging their staff to take on issues which are controversial and maintaining a consistency of approach across the school, e.g., by providing leadership, professional development, opportunities for team teaching, guidance and support, and risk management;
  • parents and local communities feeling assured that the school is on their side, e.g., being confident the school will not misrepresent or try to undermine their views or culture.
     

How can schools get active?

A good way for schools to begin is by:

  • identifying where controversial issues already feature in the school curriculum and discussing how these are currently handled, e.g., evolution, climate change or animal testing in Science;
  • considering new opportunities for introducing controversial issues into other school subjects and how they might be incorporated into teaching, e.g., the use and abuse of social statistics in Maths;
  • developing ground rules for classroom discussion which guarantee everyone a voice to express their opinion and encourage respect for whoever wishes to speak;
  • creating a small support group to help teachers develop techniques for managing discussion of difficult issues, e.g., how to ‘de-personalise’ an issue by using a story or historical parallel, or helping students to consider alternative perspectives by putting them in other people’s shoes;
  • liaising with students and parents to ensure specific issues are handled fairly and with appropriate methods;
  • introducing more opportunities for discussion in school life and decision-making generally, e.g., in parents’ meetings, staff meetings and pupil parliaments.
     

[1] ‘Free to speak, Safe to learn – Democratic schools for all’ Survey, First Trends, 2018

[2] Cowan & Maitles, ‘Feature or Footnote? Teachers’ attitudes towards the teaching of the Holocaust in primary schools in Scotland’.

Resources on Addressing Controversial Issues

Multimedia

Official texts

Policy documents

Related schools projects

Back French-Finnish School Lycée franco-finlandais d’Helsinki

Address: Raumantie 4, 00350 Helsinki

Country: Finland

 School website


Project: Finland’s precidency of the Council of Europe – Young people discuss with the experts

 

Working language during the project:

  • Finnish
     

Themes of the Council of Europe project “FREE to SPEAK, SAFE to LEARN - Democratic Schools for All” covered:

  • Making children’s and students’ voices heard 
  • Addressing controversial issues
  • Dealing with propaganda, misinformation and fake news
  • Tackling discrimination
  • Improving well-being at school
     

Competences from the Reference Framework of Competences for Democratic Culture (CDC) addressed and where / how they were integrated:

  • Knowledge and critical understanding of the world: politics, law, human rights, culture, cultures, religions, history, media, economies, environment, sustainability
    Students choose the main topics in the framework of EU-politics, look for experts and create the questions they want to ask from them
  • Valuing democracy, justice, fairness, equality and the rule of law
    Creating better understanding of EU and the political process
  • Civic-mindedness
    The discussions are done in front of a live audience and also in co-operation with a radio station, so many people can benefit from the new knowledge
     

Target group age range:

  • 15 - 19

Level of education:

  • Upper secondary education

Short description of the project:

Finland’s presidency of the Council of Europe – Young people discuss with the experts.

High school students interview experts on live radio shows produced in co-operation with a local radio station, Lähiradio. The radio programmes are also recorded, and it is possible to use them for example for educational purposes later. The programme is recorded in front of a live audience in 4 different non-profit locations in Helsinki, and the sessions are open for students from other schools and other people. The 4 locations were very open to our idea and provided the space for us – Helsinki Central Library, European Parliament’s Information Centre, local service centre for older people and our own school. We were able to reach our live audience across the age gaps, from school children to pensioners, and create conversation between different groups of people.

The project started with a good plan: we discussed the unanswered questions our students had. From those we chose the main topics:

  1. How to take part in EU politics – national and personal impact, 9.10.2019, recorded in a Europe information centre
  2. True or false - disinformation, fact checking and the EU, 21.10.2019, recorded in a Central library Oodi
  3. Your future in the EU – studying and working in the EU, 28.10.2019, recorded in the French-Finnish school
  4. Safety, immigration and human rights inside the EU and the global world surrounding it, 22.11.2019, recorded in Munkkivuori service centre

After planning the topics and finding the venues, we had to look for the experts who could answer our questions. We used many sources: teachers, parents, even people we had seen in the news. The students were happily surprised how easy it was to contact people from different fields of expertise and how accommodating they were towards our programme – thus closing the gap between youth and professionals.

The experts invited represented the Finnish Government, the European Parliament, Academia and Finnish media.

Actual shows were recorded by the professionals from the radio station. We learned interview technique, how to create a good flowing radio interview and spent a lot of time drawing up the final questions. Despite all the practice, we were quite nervous before the first programme. However, the show was a huge success, as was the rest of the series.
 

Aims/objectives

  • Learn about media and how to be actively part of media
  • Find information about European Union, Europe and the future possibilities for young people
  • Learn how to reach out to experts and discuss with them
  • Active citizenship
     

Expected results/outcomes

The participants will learn more about EU and Europe, but also about media and how to interview people. The listeners are hopefully inspired by their activity. They also get have access to new information.

We already have an interesting outcome. A group of students involved in this project have started their own radio programme at a local station.
 

Changes

 

Challenges you faced

Scheduling has been challenging, since the school days are very full. Learning interview techniques suitable for radio was something completely new for us.
 

Time-frame of the project:

September-November 2019