Researching RE Teachers. RE Teachers as Researchers

The quality of religious education in schools is highly influenced by the quality of teacher practice. Especially in times of cultural change and pluralisation we need better knowledge about the actual practice in schools. The contributions of this volume present the results of a research project on religious education teachers in Europe set up by the ENRECA group during the last years.

But who is teacher and who is researcher? On the one hand, there are academics researching religious education in schools. On the other hand, there are teachers in religious education who reflect on their own teaching continuously. What kind of relationships do they have, yielding which kind of cooperation?
This project takes teachers in RE as objects and at the same time perceives practicing teachers as 'reflective practitioners'.

The contributions intend:

• to provide information about the multicultural and multi-religious background of RE teachers in different European countries,
• to develop new research methodologies fitting to the particular objective of teacher practice in various RE settings,
• to improve teacher education by way of fostering partnership between researcher and teacher,
• to contribute to refreshed European educational policies, matching religious and cultural diversity