Loved or listened to? Parent and practitioner perspectives on young children’s well-being

ABSTRACT

Well-being is a significant concept in research, policy and practice in education, but consensus about what it is is challenging. In addition, the well-being of children under eight is under-researched. Using online surveys, this paper looks at the perspectives of 155 parent/carers and 285 practitioners in England on young children’s well-being. In many areas, there were high levels of agreement: the importance of fun and laughter, feeling good about oneself, feeling listened to, good family relationships, time and space to play and opportunities to express thoughts and feelings. Parents/carers emphasized ‘love’ whilst practitioners emphasized listening to children. Practitioners also strongly emphasized the importance of their relationships with children and parents/carers. The paper concludes that, whilst the perspectives of parents/carers and practitioners are valuable, a full understanding of young children’s well-being needs to include their voices as well as those of adults.

KEYWORDS:

• Well-being
• perspectives
• parent
• practitioner
• love
• listening

Acknowledgements

The authors are indebted to the parents/carers and practitioners who generously gave of their time, and to Dr Jessica Pitt for her work on analysis of the data.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Sue Robson is Honorary Research Fellow in the Early Childhood Research Centre at the University of Roehampton. Her research interests include young children's self-regulation and metacognition, creative thinking in early childhood, and young children's well-being.

Sigrid Brogaard-Clausen is Senior Lecturer in Early Childhood at the University of Roehampton, and was Programme Convener of the BA Early Childhood Studies Programme until September 2017. Her research interests include young children's voice and well-being.

David Hargreaves led the Froebel Research Fellowship Project from 2002–2016, and was, until his retirement in August 2017, Professor of Education and Froebel Research Fellow. His main research and teaching interests are in developmental and social psychology and arts education, particularly music.

ORCID

Sue Robson http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1396-367X

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Froebel Trust.