Structure of the thesis

There is always a question of what to include in a thesis and what to leave out.

Religious education in Estonia represents a secular religious studies approach (see chapter 2, especially section 2.2.3). Also my study falls into the framework of study of religions, and thus theological reflection is out of the scope of this study. My study is exploratory and does not intend to give a theoretical contribution to related topics. Thus I will not introduce an extensive rationale of theoretical concepts, but will give only a brief account about the theories directly used for my empirical studies and put the main emphases on the results of this empirical research.

The aim of my thesis is to explore hindrances and potentials for developing tolerance towards religious diversity among 14–16 years old Estonian students in the context of school, and of religious education in particular. It includes investigation about young people’s attitudes to religion and religious diversity, and the role school has in promoting dialogue and tolerance among represen-tatives of different worldviews. This is done in the framework of constructive epistemology and a sequential exploratory strategy was applied using a mixed

methods’ approach, combining different qualitative methods with a quantitative survey.

In the first chapter, which broadly covers conceptual and methodological issues, I give reasons for the relevance of the topic in the European context and for myself as an educator. Three keywords as used in the study – tolerance, dialogue and religious education – are presented and discussed. The main emphasis of the chapter is on a discussion of methodology, theoretical stimulus of the research and the rationale behind choosing specific research methods for data collection and data analysis. Details of the use of methods are given at this point so that readers can appreciate the range of research methods used, as well as be able to consider the strengths and weaknesses of all the empirical methods in one place. More specific and technical details describing samples are not discussed here, but are placed at the beginning of chapters presenting the results of the study. The first chapter concludes with the timeline of the research and the ethical issues that had to be taken into consideration in conducting the research.

The second chapter describes the context in which the study took place. It gives an overview of the religious landscape, general education, and the current position of religious education in Estonia. The main emphasis is put on recent trends regarding religious education in Estonia and its position on the map of religious education in Europe. This chapter explains the social and political context of the research, thus providing important information to interpret the data collected in the course of the fieldwork.

The three following chapters are dedicated specifically to my empirical studies. To answer the main research question, ‘what are the hindrances and potentials for developing tolerance towards religious diversity among 14–16 years old Estonian students in the context of school and of religious education in particular?’, it is necessary to know about the views held by students them-selves.

The third chapter presents results of a qualitative study among students on their own attitudes about, expectations of and experiences of religion and religious diversity in their personal lives and in human relations in general.

Young people are asked about situations in which they recognise religious and worldview diversity and their views on the value they place on this diversity.

The chapter also explores how they value and the role they see for religious education. The open questions give space for students’ own wordings and inter-pretations, and also enable them to explore the way they speak about religion in the context of their own life-world and of those who held different positions from their own. The study was done among 73 students from three schools, different in their geographical location and language of studies, and included both students who studied religious education and those who did not.

The quantitative study is presented in the fourth chapter. On the basis of the results of the qualitative analysis, questions for a quantitative survey were worked out. Here, some of the hypotheses of the qualitative study are checked and research questions are tested on a bigger sample. The main research

question was: ‘What role can religion in education play concerning the way students perceive religious diversity?’ The sub-questions are:

1. What role has religion in students' life and in their surroundings (important others, peers, family)?

2. How do students consider the impact of religions: do they contribute more to dialogue or more to conflict?

3. How do students see religion in school and the impact of religion in education?

Also, regarding our research questions, it was decided to use the following hypotheses to find out about the meaning of religion and religious diversity in relation to its potential for dialogue:

1a) Religious students are less tolerant than non-religious students.

1b) Religious students are less open to dialogue on religious issues than non-religious students.

2a) Students who have encountered religious diversity in education are more tolerant.

2b) Students who have encountered religious diversity in education are more open to dialogue on religious issues.

The sample consisted of 1208 students from 21 different schools in different parts of Estonia. Students varied in their religious affiliation, type of school attended (urban and rural, municipal and private), and with different models of (when offered) religious education.

The fifth chapter discusses the limitations and potentials for dialogue in religious education classes on the basis of observations and analyses of interaction in lessons. In order to answer the main research question, an analysis of observed teaching situations needed to be included in the study. Together with data on the views held by students it enabled me to study the main poten-tials and hindrances for dialogue about different worldviews in the classroom practices. The chapter reports my examination of what happens in a classroom, by observing and analysing patterns of interaction in religious education lessons in two schools. Video–ethnographic data collection was combined with sti-mulated recall. Incident–analysis stemming from conversational analysis was used to interpret the data. The chapter discusses the limitations and potentials for dialogue in religious education classes on the basis of observations of lessons. I investigated how the nature of the teacher’s questioning and responding to students’ answers contributes to the dialogue in classroom. I also explored how students’ readiness to engage in dialogue is influenced by the responses to their contributions.

In the last chapter I triangulate the results of my different studies and make suggestions for policies regarding education about religion in the context of Estonian education in the light of these empirical findings.