Introduction
In this chapter, we introduce you to the Young Researchers Project and our role in it. We explain the purpose of this book and provide a brief summary of the content of each chapter.
Encouraging young children to engage in research has always been a topic we have championed in our roles as teachers, teacher educators and heads of schools. Each of us, within our own professional remit, has read about, researched and observed children as researchers. We have attended and presented at conferences and listened to the voices of children, who have a right to influence the educational arena in which they are situated. The experiences that we share, although different, have united us in being able to write this book. We remain indebted to researchers such as Mary Kellett and Sue Bucknall, whose research on children as researchers has influenced us strongly. To begin with, it was Vivās determination to raise expectations and aspirations of the very young and those who teach them, as well as seeking partnerships with a local university, that brought us together. After five years of working together, we decided that we wanted to share the work that the teachers and children of the Young Researchers Project are doing and so began to write this book.
The Young Researchers Project involves around ten primary and secondary schools in Birmingham every year. Small groups of children (usually six to eight) work on a research project of their choosing, supported by one of their teachers. The projects begin in November and end in May/June. Towards the beginning of the project, we meet with the young researchers at our University Day, to talk to them about how to carry out the research. Throughout the year, there are regular meetings between children and adults involved in the projects to discuss progress. At the end of the year, children present their research findings at the Young Researchers Conference, held at University College Birmingham.
Working each year with young researchers towards an annual conference and the various experiences and challenges we have faced has provided us with a strong foundation on which to write the book. Our experiences of working with different, talented and inspirational young researchers have always left us on a high note, wanting and willing to share our experiences with others. Having the time to share this experience has always been an issue; however, we knew the importance of making the time to share our knowledge of promoting ways in which teachers can engage young researchers in making a difference within schools and communities. It was also important to us that, in the writing of this book, teachers were given the opportunity to share their experiences of this research process. Their accounts of the Young Researchers Project provide a real-life sense of what is involved, supporting other teachers who might want to engage children as researchers. This has probably been our greatest challenge; pulling together ideas and experiences from different teachers, in different schools teaching different ages and groups of children. However, we felt that hearing the voices of those teachersā experiences was essential to this publication, and we are grateful for all the work that they have contributed to the project.
Our joint involvement in the Young Researchers Project has gone on for five years now and the project continues to flourish. For four of those five years, we have discussed the reality of writing this book, and just over a year in the making, we are now here and we hope that this fuels your ability to start a Young Researchers Project of your own. Although this book contains some templates and writing about how to carry out your own project, it is not a āHow toā book. Working with young researchers will ālookā different in different contexts and you will need to develop your own ways of working on projects. This book is designed to help you reflect on the issues that may encounter as you embark on your own Young Researchers Project, with real-life examples of teachers and children who have done just this.
