Education for Citizenship: a case study of ‘Democracy Day’ at a comprehensive school

Abstract

This article reports on a series of whole‐school activities which took place on one day in a northern comprehensive school under the umbrella heading of ‘Democracy Day: activities for citizenship’. The activities of a school working party which had the task of planning the day are considered as well as the issues that arose from the management of the exercises on the day itself. An extensive database was used to provide an evaluation of the day. Interview and questionnaire data was gathered from three main communities: the members of staff at the school, the school pupils who became involved in the activities and the PGCE students who helped staff on the day of the event. The events of Democracy Day were also observed by one of the authors. The day had many positive outcomes. Issues are discussed about the perceptions of the nature of learning achieved by different sexes and differently aged pupils, of the reactions to different teaching and learning styles and of the perceptions of the most appropriate structure for such an event as this.