Emerging issues from The Good Childhood Inquiry

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Emerging issues from The Good Childhood
Inquiry
Bob Reitemeier Chief Executive
The Childrens Society
Childhood, Well-being and Primary Education
Conference London, 17 March 2008
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Emerging issues from The Good Childhood Inquiry

• This presentation will focus on
• Emerging issues raised in evidence to The Good
  Childhood Inquiry from
• 9,500 children and young people
• Over 1,500 adults and professionals
• Some research evidence that relates to these
  issues
• Questions to consider

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According to children, what is a good childhood?

• Friends
• Relationships in general
• Love and support
• Having fun and enjoying life

• Bullying

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According to children, what is a good experience
of learning?

• Being with friends
• A good education in a general sense
• Teachers that are supportive, interactive fun
• Directing their own learning

• Pressure of expectations, schoolwork and exams
• Disruptive behaviour
• Unfair or unreasonable rules

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According to adults, what is a good childhood?

• Love
• A moral framework / guidelines for behaviour
• Stability and safety
• Time together as a family

• Poverty
• Family breakdown
• The influence of TV and new technologies

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According to adults, what is a good experience of
learning?

• Play and exposure to risk
• Education of the whole child
• Parental involvement

• Tensions between being and becoming
• Pressure on children to achieve
• School choice and admissions policies
• Disparities in learning experiences of different
  children

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What do we know from research about friendship?

• Friends are important to children from a very
  early age, and are linked to their social and
  emotional development (Dunn, 2004)
• Friends are a protective factor e.g. when
  children start school and if they are being
  bullied (Ladd, 1990 Hodges Perry, 1999)
• More teenagers in 2006 (18) do not have a best
  friend that they can really trust than in 1986
  (13) (Collishaw et al, in press)
• UK fared badly in UNICEF analysis of
  child-wellbeing and for children finding their
  peers kind and helpful (UNICEF, 2007)

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What do we know from research about bullying?

• UK came 16th out of 21 countries for 11, 13 and
  15 year olds reporting being bullied in previous
  2 months (UNICEF, 2007)
• Bullying is widely experienced 5-10
  persistently bullied (Sharp et al, 2002). But
  evidence of a slight decline recently (Smith,
  2007)
• Different types of bullying e.g. relational and
  cyberbullying latter may be on the increase
  (Noret and Rivers, 2006)
• Some children especially vulnerable e.g.
  children with a disability or SEN are 2 to 3
  times more likely to be bullied (Smith, 2007)
• Children are more likely to tell a friend than a
  teacher or parent but some tell nobody (Smith,
  2007). Friends are an important protective factor
  (Hodges et al, 1999 Schwartz et al, 2000)

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What do we know from research about disparities
in learning?

• At the individual level
• Rising attainment overall but persistent long
  tail left behind 25 do not get a single GCSE
  at C or above (Cassen and Kingdom, 2007)
• In UNICEF analysis, UK above average for
  educational achievement, below average for
  staying on rates and for NEET (UNICEF, 2007)

• Stark differences in attainment on basis of
• SES 33 of FSM v 61 non-FSM get 5 A-Cs
• Gender 61 of girls v 51 boys get 5 A-Cs
• Ethnicity Chinese Indian attain higher but
  only 1/3 of Gypsy/Roma/Traveller at expected
  reading writing levels at 7
• Looked after children only 11 get 5 A-Cs
• (Equalities Review, 2007)

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What do we know from research about disparities
in learning?
Progress in educational outcomes for very young
children, by socio- economic status at birth

Source Feinstein reproduced in The Equalities
Review (2007)
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What do we know from research about disparities
in learning?
At the school level

• Wide variation in schools
• In bottom 10, only 32 achieve 5 A-Cs
• In top 10, 80 achieve 5 A-Cs

• A level of choice is exercised gt50 of
  secondary pupils do not go to their closest
  school (Burgess et al, 2004)
• But poorer children less likely to have a good
  school amongst nearest three 44 of FSM v 61 of
  non-FSM (Burgess et al, 2006)
• Childrens Society poll 51 of adults would be
  prepared to move house, and 14 to give false
  information to get their child into a good state
  school
• What is a good school? One in which students
  progress further than might be expected from
  their intake (Sammons, 2007)

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What do we know from research about different
aspects of learning?

• Different aspects of learning
• A rounded picture of a good school would assess
  attitudes, attendance, behaviour and self-esteem,
  as well as academic attainment (Sammons, 2007)

• Social, emotional and academic competence
  complement each other
• Learning to manage the emotions can assist
  learning (Greenhalgh, 1994)
• Programmes that teach social and emotional
  competences (mainly in the US) linked to wide
  range of educational gains e.g. improved school
  attendance, higher motivation, and higher morale
• (Durlak, 1995 Durlak and Wells, 1997 US
  Governments General Accounting Office, 1995
  Catalano et al, 2002).

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Whats it all about?

• What is the purpose of education?
• Given the importance of friends to children,
  what can we do inside and outside schools to
  better support childrens friendships?
• What should the respective roles of schools and
  parents be in childrens learning, and how might
  we better support the relationship between them?
• How can we improve the learning experience of
  those that are not doing well in the current
  system e.g. children with low attainment, that
  regularly truant or have been excluded?

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Emerging issues from The Good
Childhood Inquiry