This piece is a collective exploration by seven doctoral researchers in Child Studies, who discuss notions of listening to children and young people in a Swedish context. We approach different aspects of listening in research and in practices such as education, psychiatry, and social work. The discussions in this collective writing are an…

In this paper, we argue for the moral and not merely the legal right to education for refugee children. National education in many countries is challenged by refugee flows and influx of displaced people. However, there is a tendency to think of refugee flows as isolated events rather than parts of the dynamics of a world society that national…

The child perspective, i.e. an adult understanding and viewing of a child, is frequently being discussed. However, it is open to individual interpretation as the concept is only vaguely defined. This paper focuses on factors characterising the child perspective held by adults in an organisation which treats and supports adults and children who…

This paper presents findings from a review of 19 national curriculum policy frameworks (NCPFs) across the globe and discusses dominant and culturally specific discourses that shape early childhood education (ECE). We combine two frameworks of developmental universality and specificity and culturally contextualised pedagogy to explore whether and…

Framed by a Foucauldian governmentality perspective, this article shows teachers' different rights-teaching mentalities active in human rights education for children. The article draws on observation and interview data from fieldwork in three Year 1 classes in Swedish primary schools. In the holistic approach adopted, rights-learning is understood…

Research ethics committees (RECs) have a crucial role in protecting children in research. However, studies on REC members' perspectives on paediatric research are scarce. We conducted a qualitative study to explore Swedish scientific REC members' perspectives on ethical aspects in applications involving children with severe health conditions. The…

In this paper we conduct a poststructural discourse analysis inspired by Carol Bacchi's 'What's the problem represented to be?' (WRP) approach. We explore what kinds of problems are formulated in preschool educational policy on multilingualism, and what underlying assumptions underlie the dominant discourse on language proficiency in Sweden.…

This doctoral case study research aims to explore the values of English and Swedish pre-school teachers, focusing on their roles and the experiences they provide for 3 and 4-year-old children. Values are beliefs held by individuals to which they attach special worth or priority; and this research recognises that values are personalised and shaped…

This article contributes to the development of systematic knowledge relating to equity policies during a pandemic. Based on Didier Fassin's conception of biopolitics as a theoretical framework, the study makes use of critical discourse analysis to examine the school closure policies of two EU countries (Sweden and Spain) and one non-EU country…

This article reports a meta-synthesis of 14 qualitative studies on how teachers can support students' musical learning. The aim of the article is twofold: to (1) contribute to empirically grounded knowledge in music education, and (2) advance the methodological development of meta-synthesis in qualitative research. All included studies have a…

The article provides a global picture of school social work in 2021 using data gathered by the International Network for School Social Work. School social work is a growing specialty around the world. There are school social workers practicing in more than 50 countries. School social workers support students' educational success, especially those…

This article furthers pedagogical knowledge on educating children about their human rights, specifically in school contexts, with the aim of elucidating the features and the collateral learning of educative situations through which children are supported to grow as rights-holders. The data, obtained from fieldwork in three Year 1 classes in…

The United Nations (UN) asserts that children and young people should have access to human rights education (HRE) and that schools are one of the key means through which HRE should be made available. However, there is currently limited knowledge about the presence and form of HRE in school contexts, and there is no established means through which…

The role of education in upholding and spreading human rights is widely recognised, but knowledge about actual rights education is limited. Drawing on north European didaktik theory, this article examines human rights teaching and learning of 8-9-year-old pupils in two Swedish classes, with a special interest in what teachers and pupils consider…

This article proposes that the scope for parental involvement is limited in the current Swedish school system, despite its claim to the highest level of democracy and its extensive marketisation and juridification. In order to define this deficit, we introduce the notion of democratic parental involvement. We further trace the history of the…