Cultivating children’s rights-based knowledge: A comparative action research project with Ugandan and Canadian schoolchildren

• In Event: Strenghening global competencies and transformative practices

Proposal

Introduction
Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) states: “[Children have] the right to express…views freely in all matters affecting the child (UNICEF, 1989, Article 12), yet, few children have been educated about their rights or consulted on related policies and programming as they are considered to be too young to fully grasp the concept of rights (Howe & Covell, 2013; Wabwile, 2016). However, age-appropriate, student-centered pedagogical approaches have the potential to cultivate social responsibility and rights-based education in children (Covell et al, 2017). This paper reports on a comparative, participatory action research project in which Ugandan and Canadian primary school children explored their rights and responsibilities through an educational initiative, Child Thrive (Manion, et al, forthcoming).

Context
This research study explored the outcomes of Child Thrive workshops, developed by the International Institute for Child Rights and Development that use multimodal practices - including drawing, play, writing, discussion, and puppetry – to involve children in learning about their rights. The research focused on classes in two elementary schools in Uganda and Canada, focusing on 1) gaining a better understanding of the impact and relevance of child rights for elementary children in two different settings; 2) assessing children’s understanding of rights; 3) helping children meaningfully understand and incorporate the UNCRC into their lives; 4) enabling educators to facilitate age- and culturally-appropriate child rights education in the classroom; 5) enabling children in Uganda and Canada to engage in dialogue (through letters and drawings) about their rights.

Theoretical Considerations
This study drew on multimodality (Kress, 2011) as a theoretical framework through which children’s knowledge of, and relationship to their rights could be ascertained. This social semiotic process began with individuals’ experiences, knowledges, and understandings of their rights (Cope & Kalantzis, 2000; Jewitt, 2008) and was then acted upon through practices that engaged with selection of materials—or modes (such as images, gestures, sounds, colours, framing) to create signs, which were then taken up and interpreted by those who interacted with the sign. Multimodality enabled children to convey their ideas creatively and age-appropriately and thus override the hierarchical, formal, adult restrictiveness of text. The use of different modes produced signs and additional layers of meaning at both the creation and interpretive stages which alluded to the contextual culture, history, and knowledge (Kress, 2011). This provided insight into the meaning-makers’ real life context and how they understood rights in situ. This provided space for children’s voices that are not typically heard from within dominant discourse. In our study, the Child Thrive multimodal pedagogical model engaged children in a meaningful exploration of their rights and responsibilities, the difference between needs and wants, and the allied concepts of belonging and social responsibility.

Research and Education Methods
Entrenched in multimodality, this study employed a comparative participatory action research methodology (Shamrova & Cummings, 2017) which shifted research ‘on’ youth to research ‘with’ youth (Torre & Finne, 2006). Data collection included observation, facilitator note-taking, and analysis of workshop multimodal artefacts (e.g. postcards and artwork), which we used in our inductive approach to analysis.

Findings
Through multimodal activities, Ugandan and Canadian children identified their rights, responsibilities and the people who were responsible for upholding them. Many were similar, for instance: the right to play, to have healthy food, to go to school, the right to dance, and to a good home. There were, however, differences, such as the following.

Environment
The right to clean air and water were identified by children in Canada, but not Uganda. Air pollution (and environmental protection) may have been given more attention in Canadian schools than Ugandan schools, or perhaps this reflected that the children in Canada were more cognizant of the issues as they lived in an urban centre, whereas the Ugandan children lived in rural Uganda where there were relatively low levels of emission from cars or industry.

Gender
Reflecting normative gender roles and responsibilities, the Ugandan children posed the question to the Canadian children - “Are home chores [for children] done according to gender?” The Canadian children seemed bemused by this question as they believed there were no gender differences with respect to what was expected of girls and boys. This raised interesting context-specific questions for children's rights.

Circles of Protection
When asked about who was responsible for protecting their rights, the children in both contexts answered family, teachers, nurses, and themselves. However, the children in Canada additionally identified political personas and frontline service workers (e.g. police, firefighters), which may indicate more familiarity with these services, or their understanding of a much stronger and evident infrastructure of protection in Canada. This was further evidenced in the Ugandan children’s question for the Canadian children pertaining to what happened when someone violated a child’s rights? Who would the child turn to? What would happen to the “culprit”? The Ugandan teacher explained that this was an important question for the children in Uganda because they suffered from serious violations of their rights - including for instance lack of food, beatings, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, and neglect and abandonment, and had access to no resources for help, other than parents and/or teachers who may themselves be perpetuating abuse (Rwanyonga et al. 2009; Clarke et al. 2016). The children in Canada had little context to understand or process this question, so alternatively explored school bullying or inappropriate behaviour within the school context. Thus the notion of ‘violating children’s rights’ was interpreted in two vastly different ways.

Conclusion
This study illustrates that young children can understand, reflect upon, and communicate their own rights and responsibilities and how they relate to the rights of others. They can also offer deep insights into how children’s rights relate to their particular contexts. Embedding child rights education into the curriculum could support their self-efficacy, social responsibility, and citizenship. The keen interest exhibited by both groups of children - in Uganda and Canada - for learning more about rights and each other supports the universality of the fundamental values of human rights - empathy, dignity, justice, protection - that underscore the aspirational goals of children’s rights.

Authors

• Heather Kathleen Manion, Associate Professor

• Shelley Jones, Royal Roads University