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Cited by 77Children's Rights and ParticipationHigher Education Practises and EngagementParticipatory Visual Research Methods

'Squeaky Wheels and Flat Tires': a case study of students as reform participants

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Silva, Elena·2001·FORUM
DOI 10.2304/forum.2001.43.2.15
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Abstract

This Special Issue looks at new developments within an area of practice that FORUM, with its rich history of advocacy for genuinely comprehensive public education, has always been supportive of, namely 'Student Voice'.In the past, we have tended to approach student voice from either the standpoint of young people being given greater responsibility for their own learning through a more imaginative and flexible pedagogy, or we have concentrated on ways in which institutional forms of student engagement, such as school councils, could develop a more authentic collective voice that would lead, if not to a more democratic, then at least to more engaged forms of institutional and personal learning.Those concerns and aspirations remain.What is particularly interesting here is the fact that some of the new developments presented by a range of contributors seem to provide a bridge between the individual/pedagogic and the collective/school council practices that have so often provided the two poles of past student voice work.Now, at least within many of the examples explored and celebrated within this Special Issue, there is a sense in which not only the previously forbidden area of teaching and learning is becoming a legitimate focus of enquiry from the standpoint of students as well as teachers, but also that the roles of teachers and students are beginning to become less exclusive and excluding of each other.Similarly, there is an emerging interconnectedness between and expansion of the arenas of classroom life, the wider contexts of the school as a whole, and community spaces and practices that exist outside the school.The reciprocity between student and teacher, school and community that have always been at the heart of a widely and richly conceived notion of education seems to be expressing itself in new ways and new forms that may hold out much hope for the futureWe open our Student Voice Special Issue with three articles by young people who have been involved in some of the creative and vibrant developments alluded to above.Pupils at Wheatcroft Primary School in Hertford give a hugely uplifting and inspiring account of Working as a Team; Beth Crane's advocacy of the 'Students as Researchers' initiative as means of Revolutionising School-based Research and her fellow ex-Sharnbrook Upper School student, Chris Harding's, insistence that 'Students as Researchers' is as important as the National Curriculum lay appropriately challenging and exciting foundations for the rest of the Special Issue.Louise Raymond's overview of the groundbreaking 'Students as Researchers' initiative in her Student Involvement in School Improvement: From Data Source to Significant Voice, provides a fascinating case study of how a small but radical student-led initiative can grow into something that has the potential to transform the nature of curriculum renewal and organisational learning.Leora Working as a Team: children and teachers learning from each other PUPILS AT WHEATCROFT PRIMARY SCHOOL The first article in this Special Issue of FORUM on Student Voice is by pupils at Wheatcroft Primary School in Hertford.Together with Alison Peacock (see FORUM 43 No. 1, Spring 2001) and her colleagues, they have been involved in developing new forms of learning community in which the voices of pupils and the voices of teachers listen to and learn from each other in ways which are not only vibrant, challenging and productive, but joyful.Wheatcroft Primary School is part of Project 4 of the ESRC Consulting Pupils About Teaching & Learning programme, details of which appear at the end of this special issue.

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  1. Fielding, M. (2001) Students as Radical Agents of Change: a minute correction to the essential is more important than a hundred accessories, Journal of Educational Change, 2 (3).
  2. James, A., & Prout, A. (1990) (Eds) Constructing and Reconstructing Childhood. London: Falmer Press.
  3. The Routes Project Team (Eds) (2001) Involving Young People as Researchers: possibilities, problems and politics. Leicester: Youth Work Press.
  4. Warren, S. (2000) Let's Do It Properly: inviting children to be researchers, in A. Lewis & G. Lindsay (Eds) Researching Children's Perspectives. Buckingham: Open University Press.
  5. Dent, H.C. (1938-9) The Adolescent's Way of Life, The Hibbert Journal, 37, pp. 386-395.
  6. Entwistle, N., Koseiki, B. & Tait, H. (1989) Pupils' Perceptions of School and Teachers, British Journal of Educational Psychology, 59, pp. 326-339.
  7. Fielding, M. (2001) Students as Radical Agents of Change Journal of Educational Change, 2 (3).
  8. MacBeath, J. (1999) Schools Must Speak for Themselves: the case for school evaluation. London: Routledge.
  9. Rudduck, J. (1999) Education for All, Achievement for All, and Pupils who are too Good to Drift, Education Today, 49, pp. 3-11.
  10. Rudduck, J. & Flutter, J. (2000) Pupil Participation and Pupil Perspective: carving a new order of experience, Cambridge Journal of Education, 30(1). References
  11. Breitborde, M. L. (1996) Creating Community in Classrooms: modelling new basic skills in teacher education, Journal of Teacher Education, 47, pp. 367-374.
  12. Dayton, J.(1995) Democracy, Public Schools and the Politics of Education, Review Journal of Philosophy of Social Science, 20, pp. 135-156.
  13. Fielding, M. & Prieto, M (2000) Investigando con Estudiantes: una experiencia de practica democrática, Paideia, 28, pp. 105-128.
  14. Martínez, J.B. (1998) La voz de los estudiantes: ausencia temporal de la ciudadania Cuadernos de Pedagogia , 275, pp. 134-189.
  15. SooHoo, S. (1993) Students as Partners in Research and Restructuring Schools, Educational Forum, 57, pp. 386-393. UNESCO (1993) Speech, UNESCO General Director. International Conference on Education, Human Rights and Education, Montreal, Human Rights Teaching, 8, pp. 26-33. Notes
  16. Most of the US dropout literature is deficit-based, not looking at organizational and structural issues of the school as reasons for failure. See, for example: Michelle Fine (1991) Framing Dropouts: notes on the politics of an urban high school, in Henry A. Giroux & Peter L. McLaren (Eds) Teacher Empowerment and School Reform. Albany: State University of New York Press.;
  17. Robert B. Stevenson & Jeanne Ellsworth (1993) Dropouts and the Silencing of Critical Voices, in Lois Weis & Michelle Fine (Eds) Beyond Silenced Voices: class, race, and gender in United States schools. Albany: State University of New York Press; and
  18. A similar effect is discussed in Seymour B. Sarason (1996) Revisiting 'The Culture of the School and the Problem of Change', 2nd edn. New York: Teacher's College Press. References
  19. Fielding, M. (2001) Students as Radical Agents of Change, Journal of Educational Change, 2(3).
  20. Rudduck, J. (1999) Pupil Participation and Pupil Perspective: carving a new order of experience, Cambridge Journal of Education.
  21. Aoki, T. (1984) Towards a re-conceptualisation of curriculum implementation, in Hopkins, D. & Wideen, M.(Eds) Alternative Perspectives on School Improvement. Lewes: Falmer Press.
  22. Chapman, J. (1970) Origins & Development of School Councils, New Era, 51, pp. 268-279, 316-332.
  23. Comber, B. & Thomson, P. (1999) Just New Learning Environments: new metaphors and practices for learners and teachers in disadvantaged schools. Paper written for the Information Technology, Literacy & Educational Disadvantage Research Project, University of South Australia (to be republished for the UK Technology Colleges Trust On Line Conference for Teachers).
  24. Dahlberg, G, Moss, P. & Pence, A. (1999) Beyond Quality in Early Childhood. London: Falmer Press.
  25. Doherty, P. (2001) Curriculum Dimensions of Student Disaffection: a single site case study. Unpublished Doctoral Thesis, University of East Anglia, Norwich.
  26. Fielding, M. (1973) Democracy in Secondary Schools: school councils & shared responsibility, Journal of Moral Education, 2, pp. 221-232.
  27. Fielding, M.(1999) Radical Collegiality: affirming teaching as an inclusive professional practice, Australian Educational Researcher, 26(2), pp. 1-34
  28. Fielding, M. (2000a) The Person Centred School, FORUM, 42, pp. 51-54.
  29. Fielding, M. (2000b) Community, Philosophy & Education Policy: against effectiveness ideology & the immiseration of contemporary schooling, Journal of Education Policy, 15, pp. 397-415.
  30. Fielding, M. (2001a) Target Setting, Policy Pathology & Student Perspectives: learning to labour in new times, in Fielding, M.(Ed) Taking Education Really Seriously: four years hard Labour. London: Routledge Falmer.
  31. Fielding, M. (2001b) Students as Radical Agents of Change, Journal of Educational Change. 2(3) (forthcoming).
  32. Levin, B. (1998) The Educational Requirement for Democracy, Curriculum Inquiry, 28, pp. 57-79.
  33. Levin, B. (2000a) Putting Students at the Centre of Educational Reform, Journal of Educational Change, 1, pp. 155-172.
  34. Levin, B. (2000b) Democracy and Schools, Education Canada, 40(3), pp. 4-7.
  35. Lincoln, Y. (1995) In Search of Students' Voices, Theory into Practice, 34(2), pp. 88-93.
  36. MacBeath, J. & Mortimore, P. (Eds) (2001) Improving School Effectiveness. Buckingham: Open University Press.
  37. Peacock, A (2001) Listening to Children, FORUM, 43, pp. 19-21.
  38. Rudduck, J. & Flutter, J. (2000) Pupil Participation and Pupil Perspectives: carving a new order of experience, Cambridge Journal of Education, 30, pp. 75-89.
  39. Worrall, N, Wheeler, N., Ward, A. & James, M. (1999) Students as Researchers at Queen Elizabeth's Girls' School, University of Cambridge School of Education Newsletter, No. 5, pp. 3-5.

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Authors
Silva, E.
Corresponding author
Silva, Elena
ORCID
Silva, Elena
Venue
FORUM
Publisher
Lawrence and Wishart
Published
2001
Volume
43
Issue
2
Pages
95
ISSN
0963-8253 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.2304/forum.2001.43.2.15
OpenAlex
W2019669900
Cited by
77
References
58
Citations by year
2026: 2 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 3 · 2021: 4 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 5 · 2017: 2 · 2016: 1 · 2015: 9 · 2014: 3 · 2013: 2 · 2012: 5
FWCI
5.50
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
FORUM (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Children's Rights and Participation
  • Social Sciences › Education › Higher Education Practises and Engagement
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Participatory Visual Research Methods
Keywords
student voice, student-led research, school-based research, school councils, student engagement, curriculum redesign, organizational learning, school-community partnership

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