Introducing children's perspectives and participation in research

Abstract

Over recent years, there has been increasing attention to the importance of involving children and listening to their voices and perspectives in research. The purpose of this monograph is to draw upon exemplary research with young children that is being undertaken in partnership with academics across the globe. The articles also seek to examine some of the critical issues and ethical dilemmas in this unique research paradigm. We are pleased to present discussion from a diverse range of research settings which includes Sweden, Iceland, Italy, Northern Ireland, the United Kingdom and Australia. The underlying philosophy of each article is that all young children have the competence to engage in research as sophisticated thinkers and communicators and that the inclusion of children's views are pivotal if we are to understand their life worlds.

RÉSUMÉ: Ces dernières années, on a accordé une attention de plus en plus grande à l'importance d'impliquer les enfants et à écouter leurs voix et perspectives dans la recherche. Le but de cette monographie est de s'appuyer sur des recherches exemplaires avec de jeunes enfants menées en partenariat avec des universitaires de tous les coins du monde. Les articles visent également à examiner certaines questions critiques et dilemmes éthiques dans ce paradigme de recherche unique. Nous sommes heureux de présenter une discussion à partir d'un large éventail de travaux menés en Islande, Italie, Irlande du Nord, Royaume-Uni et Australie. La philosophie sous-jacente à chaque article est celle selon laquelle tous les jeunes enfants ont la compétence de s'engager dans la recherche en tant que penseurs et communicateurs sophistiqués et que l'inclusion des opinions des enfants est essentielle si nous voulons comprendre leurs univers de vie.

ZUSAMMENFASSUNG: In den letzten Jahren wird verstärkt die Aufmerksamkeit darauf gerichtet, dass es wichtig ist, in der Forschung die Kinder selbst zu beteiligen, auf ihre Stimme zu hören und ihre Perspektive wahrzunehmen. In dieser Monografie sollen Einzelfallstudien vorgestellt werden, die mit kleinen Kinder in Zusammenarbeit mit Wissenschaftlern aus der ganzen Welt durchgeführt wurden. Die Beiträge versuchen auch, einige der kritischen Fragen und ethische Dilemmata in diesem einzigartigen Forschungsfeld zu untersuchen. Wir freuen uns, Diskussionen zu präsentieren, die einen breiten Bereich an unterschiedlichen Forschungsansätzen aus Schweden, Island, Italien, Nordirland, Großbritannien und Australien abdecken. Alle Beiträge verbindet die zugrundeliegende Überzeugung, dass alle kleinen Kinder die Kompetenz haben, sich als anspruchsvolle Denker und Gesprächspartner an der Forschung zu beteiligen, und dass es unabdingbar ist, die Ansichten der Kinder zu berücksichtigen, wenn wir ihre Lebenswelten verstehen wollen.

RESUMEN: En los últimos años, ha habido una atención creciente a la importancia de involucrar a los niños y escuchar sus voces y perspectivas en la investigación. El propósito de esta monografía se obtiene de una investigación con niños pequeños que se lleva a cabo en colaboración con académicos de todo el mundo. Los artículos también tratan de examinar algunas de las cuestiones críticas y los dilemas éticos en este paradigma de investigación único. Nos complace presentar el debate desde una amplia gama de entornos de investigación que incluye a Suecia, Islandia, Italia, Irlanda del Norte, Reino Unido y Australia. La filosofía subyacente de cada artículo es que todos los niños pequeños tienen la competencia para participar en la investigación como pensadores sofisticados y comunicadores y que la inclusión de opiniones de los niños son fundamentales si queremos entender sus mundos de vida.

Keywords:

• children's perspectives
• sociology of childhood
• children's rights
• research with children
• listening

Introduction

One of the ways in which the European Early Childhood Education Research Association (EECERA) raises the visibility and status of early childhood research is through the establishment of networks of researchers and the facilitation of collaboration and communication between them. The Special Interest Group (SIG) Young Children's Perspectives was formed by Deborah Harcourt (Australia) and Alison Clark (United Kingdom) at the EECERA Annual Conference held in Malta in 2004. At that time, the group comprised a membership of about 10 academics/researchers from Europe, Australasia and North America who were investigating children's voices in research. This Special Issue has been a collaborative effort by members of the EECERA (SIG) Young Children's Perspectives. In particular, this issue seeks to uphold the aims of the SIG by highlighting this relatively new discipline in early childhood research through the presentation of scholarly work that:

•	generates critical reflection on children's perspectives and children's rights;
•	supports and encourages cross-national perspectives on seeking children's perspectives;
•	supports SIG members' research in a collaborative and cooperative manner; and
•	shares innovative and reflexive research on children's perspectives and children's rights.

As a result of the academic rigor of the individual papers presented by SIG members at the 2009 conference in Strasbourg, this special issue of the European Early Childhood Research Journal was commissioned and is guest edited by the current SIG co-conveners Deborah Harcourt and Johanna Einarsdottir. The SIG now has an active membership of almost 50 early childhood professionals.

Children's perspectives and participation

The emphasis on the importance of listening to children's voices to gain understanding of their learning, lives, and experiences in early childhood settings has increased in the last two decades. This change in orientation is based on views of childhood as a social construction, and children as active participants and subjects constructing their own learning (Mayall 2000; Smith 2007). Children are now regarded as ‘beings’ rather than ‘becomings’ (Qvortrup 1994) and hence childhood and children are seen as worthy of investigation in their own right (Christensen and James 2000; Clark and Moss 2001; Corsaro 1997; Dahlberg, Moss, and Pence 1999; James and Prout 1990; Mayall 2000).

The view of children as strong, knowledgeable, and contributing members of society, with their own rights and responsibilities, owes much to the mandates of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (United Nations 1989). More recently, the statement issued in the General Comment No. 7 (United Nations 2005) draws attention specifically to the rights of young children to participate in decision making that affects their lives, and to be empowered to communicate their own views. Therefore, researchers interested in listening to children are now trying to learn about children's knowledge, perspectives, views and opinions from the children themselves. However, this is not happening without tensions.

Interesting ‘spaces’

Recently, notions of children as agents and the ways in which children engage in research have been critiqued. Publications emanating from the EECERA SIG Young Children's Perspectives have pointed out challenges, paradoxes, and dilemmas in relation to young children in research (Dockett, Einarsdottir, and Perry 2009; Einarsdottir 2007; Harcourt and Conroy 2005; Harcourt, Perry, and Waller 2011; Schiller 2005; Schiller and Einarsdottir 2009). Other researchers have warned against being caught up in method for method's sake (e.g. Gallacher and Gallagher 2008). Attention has also been drawn to the idea that listening is not only a technique, ‘but a way of thinking and seeing ourselves in relationship with others and the world’ (Rinaldi 2005, as cited in Moss, Clark, and Kjørholt 2005, 6). Vandenbroeck and Bie (2006, 128) frame this as looking ‘critically at the new paradigm, since it risks being implemented as a new ‘doxa’ (Bourdieu 2001) for pedagogy' cautioning that attempts to empower and give voice to some children could marginalize others (Warming 2005; Vandenbroeck and Bie 2006). Others have also noted that concepts like ‘children's agency’ and ‘voice’ are not well suited for grasping differences and distinctions between children (Büler-Niederberger and Van Krieken 2008).

Kjørholt, Moss and Clark (2005, 176) have critiqued the way listening to children is inscribed in the rights discourse and claim that it can ‘give rise to an over-simplified idea and unambiguous view of the child and listening.’ They caution that it may create two opposing images of the child: as either vulnerable and dependent or as autonomous and competent. Broström (2006) has also drawn attention to the tensions that exist between children's rights to protection, their rights to participation, and their rights to privacy. Listening to children and recording their activities and views can be intrusive, and could be a way for the adult to monitor and manipulate the children. Under the pretext of child-centered methods and children's rights, children are under the constant surveillance of adults. Regarding this, Eide and Winger (2005, 75) ask: ‘What gives us the right as grown-ups to search for children's points of view?’

Still another critique of how the ‘children's perspective paradigm’ has been implemented is that both social context and social relations often have been overlooked. Komulainen (2007, 13), for instance, discusses the ambiguity of children's voices in research and argues that voices are always social, emphasizing that the notion of ‘voice’ must be ‘understood as a multidimensional social construction, which is subject to change.’ Meanings come into existence when two or more voices come into contact: there has to be a speaker and a listener, and ‘addresser’ and ‘addressee,’ and there will also be multiple voices and ‘multivoicedness’ (Wertsch 1991, cited in Komulainen 2007, 23). The term ‘children's spaces’ has been used to describe both the physical location of and, the social and cultural practices that underpin interactions (Moss and Petrie 2002).

Mannion (2007) suggests the need to reframe the field of children's participation and focus on child–adult relations instead. He sees listening to children's voices in research and practice as a useful starting point but emphasizes the need to simultaneously understand how children's lives are co-constructed by the actions of key adults, since child–adult relations are central in deciding which children's voices get heard, what they can speak about, and what difference it makes. Rhedding-Jones, Bae and Winger (2008, 54) make a similar conclusion:

Giving children a voice, listening to their stories, watching their agentic actions and really seeing them has to be grounded in an awareness of the asymmetric power relations between children and adults. A focus on children's voices is not just a convenient way to legitimize postmodern knowledge.

These are some of the interesting ‘spaces’ that the contributing authors have tried to build upon in order to add to our developing understanding and expertise when seeking the active participation of children in research.

The contributions

As guest editors, we are very pleased to offer the contributions of a group of authors who are leaders in the field of researching with young children. The seven research articles represent the coming together of 10 authors from Australia, England, Iceland, Italy, Northern Ireland and Sweden who have provided a range of exemplars for this field of research from diverse approaches. The articles are presented in a ‘chronological order,’ that is, we move from the youngest children at preschool in the opening article to the older children in first grade in our closing article.

The collection begins with the work of Colette Gray and Eileen Winter from Northern Ireland who seek to extend current thinking on participatory research by actively engaging young children with and without a known disability in all aspects of a research project. Explored through a social constructivist lens, within and between group interactions were observed throughout the process to determine children's level of engagement and ownership of the process. The findings suggest that when they are treated as equals, all young children can take ownership and actively participate in every stage of the research process.

Alison Clark from the United Kingdom then further considers her previous work, exploring the possibilities and challenges of extending visual, participatory methods as tools for listening to early childhood practitioners as well as to young children. This research paper is based on a longitudinal study carried out using the mosaic approach, involving young children and adults in the design and review of two early childhood environments in England. The findings offer possibilities for re-examining rather than breaking the methodological boundaries in the field of early childhood between participatory research with young children and with adults.

Deborah Harcourt, from her Australian study, affirms that contemporary early childhood studies have established young children's competence as research partners and their ability to report on matters that affect them. She proposes that many of these studies have also indicated that there may be a dissonance between what is observed of children and childhood, and what is actually experienced. It was considered highly possible that the way children experience childhood, and how adults perceive it to be experienced, may result in a disjunction between the actual and the observed. To explore this notion, four- and five-year-old children in Australia were invited to share their expertise on being a child and share the lived experience of childhood.

Luigina Mortari presents her work from Italy and focuses on the emotional side of the mind as playing an important role in human existence. On this premise, a qualitative research study was undertaken with kindergarten and primary children in order to facilitate the expression of the emotions. From the data it emerged that young children are capable of recognizing the emotions in other subjects, revealing themselves capable of empathy. The findings of the research support the notion that young children are competent thinkers and communicators about issues which require deep reflection.

Maria Magnussan and Niklas Pramling use an empirical study to analyze the appropriation of a symbolic skill by a five-year-old child at home in Sweden and report their investigation on his evolving production and understanding through his sign-making and explanations of these when speaking with a researcher. The productive use of physical separation in scaffolding the child to make an intellectual distinction is also noticed, and the issue of meta-communication, that is, communication about one's communication (representation, sign) appears to be the key not only to the development of the researcher's understanding of the child's skill but also to the child's development.

Bob Perry and Sue Dockett, from Australia, report on a project in which children were consulted about ways to improve transition to school. Children from schools and prior-to-school settings collaborated with their peers and teachers to plan, implement and document transition to school. Children attending school reflected on their own experiences while children about to start school discussed their existing knowledge and understandings, their uncertainties and questions and identified ways in which these could be addressed. The article then explores some of the methodological complexity associated with engaging young children and their teachers in research.

In the final article, Johanna Einarsdottir presents a study conducted with groups of six-year-old children in two primary schools in Iceland in an endeavour to ascertain how they recalled and reconstructed their playschool experiences. Through group interviews and drawings, the children expressed their likes and dislikes in playschool. The most memorable activity generally was outdoor play, and relations with other children were the main source of happiness and sorrow. Children's lives are affected by the social context and key adults. The results of this study show that the participating playschool teachers and children co-constructed the playschool experience. By listening to multiple voices and perspectives the study endeavours to inform and challenge practice.

As Guest Editors, we would like to acknowledge our appreciation to all of our contributing authors for their timely, considered responses which have made the early production of this monograph possible. We would also like to give thanks to the children, teachers and parents who have welcomed participation in the research presented here; the research has gone before it and; the research that is to come. Without their knowledge and expertise, the work of the EECERA SIG Children's perspectives and the work of other early childhood researchers would not be possible.