Abstract
Following a report from the United Nations Convention of the Rights of the Child Monitoring Group in 2017 noting that in Aotearoa New Zealand children’s views were not being sought in matters regarding their school, play and feelings of safety, the Children’s Commissioner conducted research with school-aged children seeking their related perspectives. However, young children’s perspectives, those under 5 years old, have not been included in this research. Concurrently, this researcher sought to learn more about children of her new community having recently relocated to Aotearoa New Zealand. In response to these two circumstances this small-scale study presents the views and voices of 12 young children regarding when and how they learn, how they participate in their communities and their hopes for the future.
Introduction
In 2017 I moved to Aotearoa New Zealand excited to engage in research and teacher education in a country that sees young children as ‘capable and confident learners and communicators, healthy in mind, body and spirit, secure in their sense of belonging and in the knowledge that they make a valued contribution to society’ (Ministry of Education, 2017: 2). However, I knew that my experiences in early childhood in the United States would not be sufficient for understanding children and their lives in my new home. I knew that my experiences as a child, as a teacher of young children and as a teacher educator in my prior contexts would have little to no relevance to the children of Aotearoa New Zealand (Lahman, 2008) and in fact could likely do more harm than good as I could only view their lives through my own cultural, experiential and adult-powered lenses. I wanted to learn from the children themselves about their lives, desiring to learn most about how and where children learn, how they were engaged in their community and what they thought about the future.
While I was settling in and building relationships with early childhood settings in my new community, colleagues directed me to research being conducted by the Children’s Commissioner of Aotearoa New Zealand that had been directly seeking children’s views regarding their living conditions and what they felt it might mean to live a good life (Children’s Commissioner, 2019). However, I was disappointed to find that this research had been conducted with school-aged children thus the voices and views of young children, those under 5 years old, had been excluded. This omission of young children’s voices and my own desire to know these younger children and their lives better were the motivating factors behind my research questions:
What do children want us to know about what and how they learn? how are they involved in their communities? what do they think about the future?
This article focuses on the views and voices of what 12 children, between two-and-a-half and 5 years of age in one community of the Te Waipounamu South Island New Zealand, wanted to share with the world in response to these questions. In other publications I have described the consultation process undertaken with older children to determine if this research question was worthy of young children’s time and energies as well as the co-construction of a research protocol to be used with younger children (Gaches and Gallagher, 2019); how critically reflexive ethics in practice was utilised to address ethical issues as they arose, most particularly as related to issues of representation (Gaches, 2020); and how an ongoing informed consent process was utilised to better ensure that children understood the purpose of the research project and how their voices and ideas would be used (Gaches, 2021). 1 In each of those publications it was noted that while children’s voices, experiences and expertise informed my researcher-learning and knowledge, the young children’s voices and the ideas they wanted to share with the world would be prioritised in a later publication. This is that publication.
Young children’s views and voices matter
Historically children’s lives were researched and analysed from the perspectives of adults conducting research on children or about children (Smith, 2013). However, following the horrific conditions that children had been enduring in prior centuries and then through two world wars (Humanium, 2021; Murray et al., 2020), a movement towards the prioritisation of children’s rights was undertaken in the latter decades of the previous century. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) (United Nations, 1989) made children’s rights legally binding in the same way as other human rights, including children’s rights to education and for children to have a say in decisions made about them. Amongst other rights, the UNCRC proclaims children’s rights to enjoy leisure, recreation and cultural activities; their right to enjoy and to practice their own culture, religion, and language without fear of persecution or discrimination; and their right to privacy, protection and autonomy. More specifically, the UNCRC states that children have, amongst these and other rights:
the right to express their views on all matters affecting them and for their views to be taken seriously (Article 12)
the right to freedom of expression, including freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds through any media they choose (Article 13).
The right to education that supports the development of the child’s personality, talents and mental and physical abilities to their fullest potential (Article 29)
The United Nations Committee’s General Comment No. 12, The Child’s Right to Be Heard (Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, 2009) emphasised children’s rights to participate in decisions affecting them and to have their views taken seriously: The views expressed by children may add relevant perspectives and experiences and should be considered in decision-making, policymaking and preparation of laws and/or measures as well as their evaluation. (p. 5)
Research has shown that children can tell adults about their lives, their experiences, and the concerns that they have for people close to them and for their immediate environment (e.g. Alderson, 2008; Diaz Soto and Swadener, 2005; Lundy et al., 2011; MacNaughton and Smith, 2008; MacNaughton et al., 2007; O’Kane, 2008). This research supports the argument that young children:
can construct valid meanings about the world and their place in it
know the world in alternative (not ‘inferior’) ways to adults
can provide perspectives and insights which can help adults to understand their experiences better (MacNaughton et al., 2003: p. 15).
While the New Zealand’s Children’s Commissioner is responding to the need for children’s and youth’s perspectives to relevant UNCRC articles, UNCRC General Comment No. 7 (2005) has gone unheeded. This general comment states that all of the rights of the UNCRC, specifically including Article 12, are to be ensured for young children of early childhood years (birth to school age). It acknowledges the strength and capabilities of young children and that young children can communicate their ‘feelings, ideas and wishes in numerous ways’ if adults are attuned to their evolving communication capabilities. Furthermore, adults must listen and respond with patience and creativity. Therefore, this research actively sought to address previously mentioned lack of engagement with young children’s views in matters that pertain to them in a manner that would best fit their unique strengths and capabilities.
Children’s views as research data
As a researcher I have a history of looking for meaning in discourse beyond the presented written texts (Gaches and Hill, 2017; Gaches and Walli, 2018) or interviews (Gaches, 2017) drawing upon critical discourse analysis to illuminate instances of power imbalances and issues of equity and social justice (Fairclough, 2013; Gee, 2005; Tobin, 2000). When analysing discourse for this purpose, the researcher is drawing attention to meanings beyond the face-value of the stated text, looking for underlying messages and meanings in the discourse, seeking patterns and associations with other discourses and social issues. However, while utilising critically reflexive ethics in practice in this research, I decided to take another approach.
Christensen and Prout (2002) utilise the concept of ethical symmetry to argue that ethical principles for adults should apply for children, unless there are special or unique considerations ‘in the concrete situation of children, rather than being assumed in advance’ (p. 482). The participating children were known to me as I had been visiting their settings in another capacity for some time. I was familiar with their interests, their manners of interacting, and their evolving skills and capacities. I drew from this knowledge as well as the prior consultation with older children when considering the ethical aspects of this research.
When conducting research with adult populations, we generally assume that they are consenting to their contributions being compared with others’ contributions and perhaps analysed for deeper meaning to determine findings of a larger scale. Information and consent forms often do not even mention how data provided by the participants will be analysed. A great deal of research has been conducted regarding the consent process and young children, (see e.g. Bitou and Waller, 2011; Graham et al., 2013; Gray and Winter, 2011; Harcourt and Conroy, 2011; Te One 2007, 2011). I provided information and sought consent from the children as I would with any (adult) participant, though the way I did so was responsive to what I knew about these children. Specially created information and consent booklets stated that I would ‘share some of your ideas with other grown-ups’. Children have presented their ideas to me as they wished for them to be shared at the face-value of what was being shared in that moment. My informed consent contract with them stated that I was sharing their ideas with the world. I did not contract with them to analyse their stories and statements for meaning beyond that face value and thus, my data analysis has attempted to maintain my consent contract with them verbatim. 2
Additionally it is important that children understand what research is and how their contributions will be analysed and disseminated (Smith, 2011, 2013). A priority of this research was seeking children’s views then following up with children to ensure that I was understanding what they were saying and wanted shared. The children understood this purpose of the research as they frequently reiterated and acknowledged that I could ‘share with the world’ their ideas. When consenting to participate in research, adults (and many older children and youth) often have a greater understanding of what research is and how their ideas may be analysed more deeply. Again, this deeper level of analysis was not made evident to the young children in this study as part of the information and consent process. Therefore, the thoughts and ideas of these young children have been analysed through a thematic analysis to more easily facilitate sharing with other adults, just as the research information booklets explained to these young children. However, it is acknowledged that there remains a tension between sharing children’s voices as they have intended and a thematic analysis conducted from my adult standpoint.
Also, it is important to note that while what follows are the views and voices of these children in their own time and places and thus are not necessarily representative of other children in their own time and places (James, 2007), these children’s perspectives can (and should) open possibilities for future thinking and action just as can be considered in other small scale studies with older research participants.
Method
The research methods used in this study were created in consultation with older children and underwent multiple layers of institutional procedural ethics and critically reflexive ethics in practice. As mentioned previously, special information/consent booklets were created for the children. The research took place in two early childhood settings on the Te Waipounamu South Island of Aotearoa New Zealand. These settings were across town from each other and were different types of services: a kindergarten (8 children) and a non-profit community-based centre (4 children). Demographically all children choosing to participate were between two-and-a-half and 5 years of age, were primarily of European descent, and their families represented a wide variety of income levels.
After spending several weeks building relationships with children, we began our focused conversations while drawing with markers or building with LEGOs, as planned with the older research consultants. After a few sessions, child-friendly cameras were also introduced to the children. The children took pictures around their early childhood setting as talking points during my next visit. This was a research method that one of the older school-child consultants deemed to be quite important as he felt it would offer younger children another way to share with me what was important in their world when I wasn’t around. Our focused conversations with the cameras involved sitting with children who were interested, who may or may not have been the ones taking the pictures, and looking at the pictures in the viewing window on the back of the camera. Children would tell me about who was in the photographs, what was happening, and how the child may have used some of the special effects.
If children did not consent to ‘share their ideas with the world,’ we would just play and chat generally. If children did consent (and this was confirmed with each child throughout each session) then we would turn on my phone’s encrypted recording application (a device with which the children were familiar) and our general conversations would then shift towards the research questions. As the children were drawing/building or talking about the photographs, I would ask them questions such as, “What do you think the world will be like when you are an adult?” Other times they might show me something they drew/built or photographed and I would ask them how they learned to do that and what else have they learned. Often the question of how they were engaged in their communities would arise quite naturally in the conversation as they talked about going places with their families. I would then likely expand on the conversation, if the child was willing, and ask “Where else do you go sometimes?” or a similar question.
During all of these focused conversations, if children shared something particularly personal or in-depth, I would check if it was okay if I shared that story with the world. If not, or if a child indicated that they no longer wanted to share their ideas with the world, that part of the recording was not transcribed. All other recordings were transcribed and were then used to create small data booklets for each child where the child’s comments related to the research question were presented in a storybook format (see Figure 1). Each booklet was printed, and I returned to the early childhood setting to read these booklets with each child, my contextualisation in black print and the child’s words in red (reproduced in this article by italicised text). The child then would confirm that I had recorded their ideas as intended, explain how I needed to change or delete their statement or perhaps add to the statements. Changes made to the data booklet are noted by underlining and corresponding references to subsequent transcripts at the bottom of the page. Only when the child stated that I had their ideas as they intended was this process done. This is the only data that has been used for analysis and is presented here.
Sample from AB’s data booklet.
As mentioned previously, analysis of the data proceeded carefully so as to prioritise the children’s views and voices. Nonetheless a mechanism was needed to analyse the data for insights that could inform adults’ understanding of children’s lives. Therefore each statement from a child was coded based upon its relevance to the research questions then the topic of the child’s response. For example, the upcoming passage where P discusses learning to ride her bike was coded as W-riding bike where W refers to the research sub-question, what do children report they learn, and riding bike references the content of her stated learning. The entire set of coded data with corresponding data location information (noting setting, child, transcript and line number) was charted on an Excel spreadsheet and analysed for common themes amongst the children’s responses as well as unique contributions that might provide additional or surprising insights for adults. More extended passages of particular importance to a child, based upon the children’s own emphasis during the sharing, were further analysed for any additional unanticipated topics.
What these children wanted us to know
What and how children learn
Children reported learning about many things often centred around regularly-occurring play-based topics (see Table 1). It made sense that learning about drawing/colouring, building and camera use would be mentioned as our focused conversations took place around these activities. The event from a news programme, mentioned by one child, was regarding how some people can end up quite literally with egg on their face when they do bad things, in reference to the Australian politician who was egged by a teenager for remarks following the Christchurch mosque attacks. During our first focused conversation when I asked B 3 what she has learned, she straightened her posture and proudly proclaimed that her mum and dad taught her ‘to stand up for myself and have a giant voice’.
What children say they learn.
Children made a point to tell me that they were learning several school-based skills, such as counting, how to write their own names and how to play in particular ways following rules and procedures. I wondered if the frequent mention of these learned skills was because these are often privileged and seemingly adult-prioritised skills that children feel they should be learning and thus wanted us to know that they have learned. This passage from Co’s data booklet illustrates how children would balance the child-focused and valued learnings with more adult-desired learning (Co’s comments are in italics): One of the first days that I was talking with the children in your kindergarten about their ideas, I asked some of the children who were drawing with me what kinds of things they learn about. You spoke out first and told me
I play with the bikes
And then you told me
I do numbers, too.
While Co first stated that he was learning to play with the bikes, he then made sure that I knew that he was also learning about numbers. Yet bike riding is a frequently observed and highly prioritised skill in Co’s kindergarten. P further emphasises this point, drawing from her bike riding abilities to position herself as powerful as an older peer, W, as can be seen in this passage:
Yeah, but I’m a little four year old. But W is a big one and I’m a little four year old that can ride my bike. . . .I can ride a bike with no training wheels for a really 4 year old like me. But I can ride it with no training wheels.
P and Co both clearly want us to know that bike riding is an important skill to learn, at least in their setting and as P tells us repeatedly, riding the bike with no training wheels is particularly important.
The continuation of this passage from P also provides insight into what children want us to know about how they learn (the underlined passage was added during the member-checking review process).
Really? Where do you ride your bike?
At my gramma and poppa’s home. I have no training wheels on my bike.
Nice! How did you learn how to do that?
Nuh-uh-uh.. I just did it. On the first day my dad took them up and I just sitted and I went “I know how to do this, dad”. I just pushed on it. I pedalled
You just pushed and you pedalled and you did it, huh.
And I did it straight away!
As P states here, many children explained that they learned to do things by just doing it or that they just knew how or knew the information (see Table 2). This reinforces that children likely see themselves as ‘capable and confident learners and communicators’ (Ministry of Education, 2017: 2) or possibly that they don’t know how they’ve learned or perhaps that they don’t quite know how to explain it.
How children say they learn.
Yet P informs us that her father also had a role to play in this learning. Parents were frequently mentioned sources of learning. These particular children mentioned learning things more often from their fathers than from their mothers. One child mentioned the role her grandparents played in her learning, and for these children, siblings were mentioned as frequently as learning from mothers. One child provided a rather lengthy explanation of how a book at home taught her everything she knows about pirates.
The early childhood setting itself was very minimally the site of how children were learning, according to them. Only once did a child mention learning from a teacher. This was in reference to the time a teacher brought a lamb from her home and the children were learning about how to care for the lamb. There was conflicting messaging on the role of play in children’s learning. P once again provided some insight as we looked at photographs of friends playing:
I did some [photos] because I’ve been thinking I’m going to snap the photo of (friend)
Of (friend)? What’s he doing?
Um, playing with making the small tower and a small flower.
Is he learning something with that?
Um, yes.
What’s he learning?
Um, he’s learning to be, just learning to make towers.
So is one of the ways you learn by just doing those things or how does that work?
Good. It works really good for me and him.
And yet, when MK and I looked at some photographs of children playing, and when I asked her what they were doing she replied:
It’s (pause) dere fighting
They are fighting? Do you think they are learning anything while they are fighting?
No way!
These children also shared that activities in the world away from home and the early childhood setting are ways that children learn. M explained that she learned how to put cones around her play space to keep other children away, after learning how traffic cones are used in the community to keep people out of dangerous areas on the street. The same child also performed for me 1 day how a cartoon character taught her to close her eyes and take a quick nap and then she’d suddenly wake up, say ‘donut’ and know how to do what was needed.
Finally, after stating that her dad teaches her and that she just knows things, E completely surprised me by stating that she was learning from me, by having the focused conversations and reading the data booklets.
Well then how do learn how to do stuff then?
Daddy! Just ME!
Oh you? You teach you how to do stuff. How do you do that?
Cause I do.
Hmm. That makes sense. One day you can just do it?
E’s view of this research process provides insight as to how being a part of research can be valued by young children as a learning experience for them.
How children describe being engaged in the community
Children reported being engaged in the community primarily through their day-to-day life, through family interactions, shopping, in a community event and events with friends (see Table 3). Perhaps not surprisingly, in the early childhood setting where learning to ride a bike was mentioned by two children as a powerful skill, two other children in that setting mentioned riding their bikes to a particular nearby park with their family members.
How children describe being engaged in the community.
One of the youngest participants, at two-and-a-half years old, CH mentioned other forms of transportation in the community stating that there are cars, boats and aeroplanes. This same child also explained
I got an alien one, one night.
It’s a ghost in the night. I saw a ghost one night.
And it was smoky.
He didn’t want to elaborate further and shifted the topic to his new finger bandage.
Children also mentioned farther global destinations they or their family had visited (America, Australia, Colorado). P also shared an imaginative story about how she jumped up really high on her trampoline to the moon and her dad tossed her even higher to the planets and stars. Then he tossed up Colorado where she landed and then came back home by climbing down a ladder. When we were looking at photographs children had taken of other children playing, P also explained how the play handcuffs were different than those used elsewhere:
I put the [play]handcuffs on them for being naughty.
Why else do people get handcuffs on?
Cuz, they are a baddie.
Ohh. So why do badies have to wear handcuffs?
Because they stoled by dad’s motor bike.
Oh dear!
And they are naughty badies!
This was the only time a child shared a negative comment about the community and how they are engaged within it.
What children think about the future
Children were quite reticent to discuss the future. Frequently I received silence to my inquiries or even an occasional withering glare followed by a change in topic from the child (see Gaches, 2021 for a more detailed description of one of these encounters).
Of the children who responded to this inquiry (see Table 4), several girls mentioned they would be mums and as can be seen in Figure 2, M has even named her future child Emily. F simply stated, ‘My baby will live here’, leading me to believe that in her future she sees herself as a mum living in this same town.
What children think about the future.
Sample from M’s data booklet.
A friend in the same setting, ER, drew a picture of her hand (see Figure 3) and when I asked why she had different coloured fingertips she responded, ‘Just because I am on a stage. Um, um, I’m in a band and it’s just that I’m gonna be doing that’.
ER’s drawing from her data booklet.
The only boy who was willing to share his thinking about the future, Co, stated
Umm, probably I’m going to be a Captain America.
A Captain America? How can you become a Captain America?
I don’t know.
What are you going to do if you’re Captain America?
Uh, save people.
One has to wonder if the proliferation of recent super-heroes on television, movies, children’s clothing and so on have pushed aside from children’s aspirations those community superheroes who save people in our everyday lives (e.g. first responders, medical professionals).
For AB, the future was focused on the 5-year-old milestone birthday in Aotearoa New Zealand. It is on this birthday that children traditionally are farewelled from the early childhood setting with a celebration and become a school-child immediately thereafter. AB had big plans for her fifth birthday stating
Ummm, when I’m going to be 5, I’m going to wish to have a unicorn cake. And the whole thing is going to be rainbow. On the outside will be rainbow and the inside will be rainbow AND
And I’m going to invite
And I’m going to have a piñata there. It’s going to be a unicorn one – no a squid piñata. But my mom is going to TRY to buy a piñata but I don’t know what kind it is. But she doesn’t know what it is.
AB took this planning very seriously and went back to revise her plans two additional times (signified by the multiple underlining). Yet this excitement could also be indicative the importance children often put on this important fifth birthday in this local context.
One surprising finding was that no children mentioned anything about the environment or the world at large. This is particularly surprising as these focused conversations took place during the global children’s marches for climate change.
Adult thinking, potential implications and concluding remarks
The purpose of this research was to learn from young children about their lives and these 12 children have shared with us what they want the world to know about their thinking and their experiences. Allowing children this choice to participate in the research is critically important. While I received consents from many parents in both settings (over 30 families in total) only 12 children across the two settings chose to participate. Yet these 12 children nearly always engaged with me and had some idea to share with the world on each visit. Additionally, that engagement and consent must be always contingent, asking in ways appropriate to the children in that time and place, ‘Can I share your ideas with the world?’ (Docket et al., 2011; Gaches, 2021; Graham et al., 2013; Gray and Winter, 2011). Then, as researchers, we must respond with openness and care (Gaches, 2020).
In this research with these children, in this time and place, children have shared with us what and how they learn. They learn about what’s important in their particular settings, such as bike riding, and they learn things adults would be more likely to expect, such as writing their names, counting, and the rules and procedures of the setting. They tell us they just know things, teach themselves and that they learn through play and from their family members as well other people, places and things. They share that they are engaged in their communities as part of their families’ ongoing activities while making connections to more ethereal or imaginative outings. Their view of the future remains primarily locally situated, becoming mums, a musician in band or someone helping other people. This is my summary and my interpretation of what they are wanting us to know. Other adults may interpret these children’s voices otherwise. The children themselves likely have further interpretations. In what follows I describe some of my further adult thinking in response to what these children have shared. I also offer some possible implications for the thinking and work of other adults based upon my adult perceptions.
One rationale for this study was so that I could better understand the children of my new setting. These young children taught me a great deal. The following are just a few key points. I learned that older people are ‘adults’, not ‘grown-ups’. I developed an increased appreciation for and understanding that sometimes children just know things and they are more than capable of just teaching themselves. Yet I also learned that participating in research like this may help them learn, too. I learned about where children go and what they do in their community and that one particular park played a fairly large role in one setting’s community.
I was surprised when the young girls focused on their futures as mums, that a young boy was focused on becoming a Captain America, and that nobody showed an interest in more global future-oriented issues. Yet it is important to note that some of these moments that surprise us, adults, could also be important entry points to better understand children’s perspectives more fully.
In some regards I regret not further pursuing these conversations with the children to find out more from their perspectives. Alternatively, I’m not entirely confident that our relationships were sufficiently developed to prod more into their thinking. For example, when I asked Co more about becoming Captain America, his responses became briefer, and he appeared more intently engaged on his drawing rather than talking. If I were a teacher in the setting, this is a point to which I could return another time or watch for in play episodes in the setting in order to gain further insights from his perspective. Being surprised by the number of girls focused on becoming mums, I wonder if other possibilities could be introduced into the setting by highlighting work their own or other mums do away from the care they provide for their children and home. Then again, more information is needed from these children as to why this is their aspiration. Perhaps it is indicative of a particular narrative being enacted in their setting at that time and their friend’s aspirations to play in a band becomes a shared next view of their future. It must be remembered that the ideas these children are sharing are of this moment in their lives. Possibly the absence of children engaging in conversations around the sustainable future of the world was the more general nature of my questioning. It could be that, from these children’s perspectives, it’s not part of the future but of the here and now. I could also have been holding an erroneous assumption that children are aware of this topic in the news and community. Of course an alternative explanation could be that my adult-self is not listening to the children’s languages in ways they are communicating (Edwards et al., 2011). Yet I found myself questioning how to respectfully further prod for children’s perspectives and balance this apparent silence with my adult perspective of this as a critical issue with which young children should be aware. These are questions and issues that adults need to consider and pursue in order to genuinely engage with and respond to children’s views and voices.
Another rationale for this study was to seek the voices of children who the Children’s Commissioner (2019) had excluded in their studies. While this is an admittedly very small-scale study in one region of Aotearoa New Zealand, these 12 young children have provided insights into their lives that the Children’s Commissioner has yet to explore. Further larger scale, yet similar research is needed to stand alongside the voices of older children and youth in the nation to better understand the needs and desire of children of all ages. If older children’s and youth’s voices are to be utilised to guide policy and practices as the Children’s Commissioner has argued, the same opportunity must be provided to younger children of the nation as well.
What do these children’s views and voices tell the adults of the world? That is largely up to the adults to decide. These 12 children can help adults in their local context understand their lives better to make decisions for those contexts. These 12 children can provide insights to the world about what children are thinking and perceiving that then might inform adults’ insights in other contexts. For example, while adults may be prioritising school readiness skills, what might the children in a different local context find to be more worthy or powerful to be learning? It likely won’t be bike riding as it was for P and Co, but what might it be? There are times where children share their perspectives freely and quite clearly state what they feel is important. For some of these children it was bike riding, being a mum and milestone birthday celebrations. There are other times where children’s stated views may be hints that adults need to cautiously proceed further, providing opportunities for children to share their perspectives in many, varied manners as UNCRC General Comment No. 7 (2005) reminds us. However, as researchers, educators, policy makers, parents or any adult, it is our responsibility to respectfully and sensitively seek out, listen to, and act in accordance with and consideration of children’s views and voices.
