This project is co-led by Sue McDowall from NZCER and Prof Roseanna Bourke and Prof John O’Niell from Massey University.
The project explores children’s views of their informal learning during the five-week lockdown (school closures) of Alert Level 4, Aotearoa’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Approach
Over 200 children in Years 4 - 8 (8 - 12 year olds) will be recruited from ten to twelve schools in the Wellington and Manawatu regions.
Within groups of their peers, these children will be invited to take part in a warm-up collage activity about their learning at home. They will then talk individually with researchers in a semi-structured interview at either their school or home. This will allow students to include siblings and/or adult family members in the interview.
A Children’s Research Advisor Group (CRAG) will be established to advise the researchers on:
- The interview questions
- Interpretation of the data
- Dissemination of the findings to children.
The research questions are:
- What did Year 4 - 8 children learn, and learn about themselves as a learner, during the lockdown, with their family/ whanau?
- How do the children think they could use this learning back in the school context, and through their everyday learning?
- How has their view of themselves as a learner changed?
Findings from the research will be published in different formats for different audiences including children, parents, teachers, principals, researchers, and policy makers.