Integrating Children’s Perspectives in Practice Development

This presentation is part of this Symposium:
Shared practices across countries – Children as quality approvers: A way to develop Extended Education for the future?

Presentation type: Symposium
Chair: Gunn Ofstad
Discussant(s): Patricia Schuler

Description:
Symposium: Shared practices across countries – Children as quality approvers: A way to develop Extended Education for the future? This symposium presents insights from the Erasmus+ project Extended Education Facilitating Key Competences through Cooperative Learning (EKCO), a collaboration between researchers and practitioners from Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Austria, and Switzerland. The project explores how Extended Education (EE) can be developed across national contexts through shared learning that promotes inclusion, cooperation, and sustainability. A key premise is that children’s participation is not only a pedagogical principle but also a mechanism for evaluating and shaping quality in EE. The first paper introduces the EKCO project and outlines how EE is conceptualised and practiced across the five countries. It highlights how children’s participation is embedded in everyday activities and how their perspectives are used to co-develop and validate practices. Drawing on Lundy’s (2007) model of participation—space, voice, audience, and influence—and Hart’s (1992) ladder of participation, the paper argues that meaningful involvement of children transforms them into quality approvers, ensuring that practices are inclusive, relevant, and democratic. The second paper examines the shift from seeking “best practices” to developing “shared practices.” Initially, the project aimed to identify exemplary models of EE, but reflection across national and professional boundaries revealed the limits of standardised approaches. Instead, the project adopted a more democratic process of co-construction, where researchers and practitioners jointly tested and refined practices. These reframing challenges conventional notions of quality and highlights the value of shared learning and engagement in building sustainable educational practices. Methodologically, the paper shows how iterative collaboration encouraged professionals to develop practices that support children’s agency and participation. The third paper presents examples of practices developed within the EKCO project, focusing on how children’s perspectives were integrated into evaluation and development. Drawing on situated learning theory (Lave & Wenger, 1991) and Tanja Miller’s work on children’s perspectives (Sommer, Pramling Samuelsson & Hundeide, 2010), the paper explores how children initiated and shaped activities and acted as agents of value. Miller’s distinction between adult interpretations of children’s perspectives and children’s own expressed views highlights the importance of authentic participation. The paper discusses variations in how children’s voices were valued across contexts and how these differences influenced practice development. Together, the three papers show how children’s participation can serve as a form of quality assurance in Extended Education. By positioning children as co-developers and contributors, the EKCO project offers a model for democratic and sustainable practice development. The symposium contributes to Nordic educational research by aligning with values of democracy, participation, and equality, and by illustrating how cross-national collaboration fosters shared professional learning and innovation in EE.
References Hart, R. (1992). Children’s Participation: From Tokenism to Citizenship. Florence: UNICEF. Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge University Press. Lundy, L. (2007). ‘Voice’ is not enough: Conceptualising Article 12 of the UNCRC. British Educational Research Journal, 33(6), 927–942. Sommer, D., Pramling Samuelsson, I., & Hundeide, K. (2010). Child Perspectives and Children’s Perspectives in Theory and Practice. Dordrecht: Springer.