"Everybody Is a Citizen": Fifth-Grade Students Talk About Citizenship

• In Event: (Re)Defining Social Studies in the Elementary Classroom

Abstract

Adult-centric conceptions of citizenship have dominated research into elementary citizenship education despite being insufficient to describe the citizenship knowledge and civic actions taken by early childhood and elementary-aged children. While typologies abound regarding how secondary students and adults engage in citizenship, voices of elementary students are rare in the extant literature. Acknowledging a need to include the voices of young children when defining citizenship, this paper examines how fifth-grade students understand and define what it means to be a citizen and how their understandings of citizenship evolve over time.

Authors

• Stephanie Schroeder, The Pennsylvania State University

• Jennifer Lynn Cody, The Pennsylvania State University