Designing Research to Capture Changes in Students’ Citizenship Knowledge

This paper aims to develop methods for analysing whether, and in what ways, students’ citizenship knowledge develops as a result of an intervention in social science education in upper secondary schools in Sweden. Recent reports indicate a decline in students’ knowledge of democracy, coinciding with increasing segregation and political polarization. Research further suggests that teaching in vocational and preparatory programmes is informed by different civic ideals, which in turn affect schools’ compensatory role in promoting democracy. The paper is situated within an interdisciplinary project investigating how inquiry-based teaching focusing on trust can support the development of students' critical citizenship skills and, how such teaching may help bridge differences between different student groups. The first part of the paper outlines methodological challenges identified in a previous project, including: detecting changes in students’ reasoning about trust even when their trust levels remain stable; tracing advancements in reasoning among students from different groups who express themselves in different ways; and acknowledging out-of-school experiences as integral to students’ knowledge. The second part presents a mixed methods design consisting of qualitative analyses of focus groups, an assessment tool used in pre- and post-tests, and a DID (difference-in-difference) analysis of survey data from treatment and control groups.