The Palgrave Handbook on Participatory Action Research with Children seeks to explore the diverse approaches to participatory action research (PAR) with children across disciplines and in various settings and contexts from around the globe. As interest in participatory action research with children grows, there is a need for more literature detailing the processes and approaches across its various stages.The Handbook offers insights from researchers across six continents coming from diverse academic and professional backgrounds at varying stages of their careers and experiences in conducting PAR with children. It focuses on the importance of children’s participation in research while taking into account their rights, diverse lived experiences and contexts, ethical considerations, power dynamics, social inequalities as well as acknowledging limitations and challenges. The chapters explore the possibilities of advancing methodologies and approaches to PAR with children, inclusive practices throughout the PAR process, relational and curricular impact of PAR with children, and the ethics, challenges and opportunities of conducting PAR with children in different settings with the support of or co-led by community-based organizations. This volume seeks to impress upon the reader that PAR with children can be empowering to everyone involved - adults and children - if done ethically, with adequate training and support, and with the active participation and involvement of children as researchers/co-researchers and co-creators of knowledge throughout the process.
Hala Mreiwed is a children's rights advocate, advisor, educator and researcher with over 20 years of experience in research, curriculum development and pedagogy, training and education, children's media and children's rights education.
Introduction to The Palgrave Handbook on Participatory Action Research with Children; Hala Mreiwed.- Part I - Advancing methodologies and approaches to participatory action research with children.- Transdisciplinary and Participatory Action Research in the Context of Children’s Rights; Sarah Zerika, Johanna Zelck, Evie Heard, Maude Louviot, Zoe Moody and Frédéric Darbellay.- Conversando, Chismeando, y Merendando Juntas: Conversations (pláticas) as a critical Latin American and Latina/x feminista methodology in YPAR; Melisa Argañaraz Gomez.- At their own Pace: Feminist Participatory Action Research with Child-Mothers in Uganda; Shelley Jones and Kathleen Manion.- Embedding Trauma-Informed Care in Participatory Action Research with Children: Advancing Teacher Preparation and Ethical Practice; Christopher Hinbest.- Empowering Children’s Voices and Choices: A Strength-Based Mosaic of Participatory Action Research Methods for Upholding Children’s Rights; Emmie Henderson-Dekort.- Child-Led Curriculum Practices in an Art Education Project in China, 2014-2024: A Participatory Action Research Approach; Lei Chen.- An Interdisciplinary Approach to Participatory Action Research and Narrative Inquiry: Child Rights and Digital Experiences; Shiva Joudaki.- Part II - Ensuring inclusion, and acknowledging power dynamics and social inequalities in participatory action research with children.- Is the Child as Co-Researcher Possible? Exploring the (Im)possibilities of Participatory Action in Childhood Research; Seran Demiral, Duru Çiçek, Gamze Özdemir.- Please include us! The Why and How of Inclusive Participatory Action Research with Disabled Children in International Contexts: A Nigerian Example; Mary Wickenden.- Co-creating Knowledge, Challenging Inequality and Power: A PAR Experience with Young Black Women in a Brazilian Periphery; Camila Costa Cardeal, Simon Lapierre, and Ludmila Ribeiro.- “It’s nice to finally get a say … like it might indirectly help someone else”: Participatory action Research to Improve Children and Young People’s Participation in Australian Family Law; Georgina Dimopoulos and Eliza Hew.- “I felt heard and like somebody actually cares about us:” An Analysis of Benefits and Barriers of Co-producing a Participatory Action Research Project with Justice-Involved Young People; Daniella Bendo, Madison Moore, Christine Goodwin De Faria, Caitlin Baruth, and Kayla Getty.- Dos and Don’ts for Adult Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) Facilitators: A Student-led Analysis of What it Takes to Engage and Empower Young People; Ash Adler-Eldridge, Reina Cruz, and Dane Stickney.- Part III – The relational and curricular impacts of participatory action research with children: Possibilities and recommendations.- The Connective Power of Youth Participatory Action Research: An Intergenerational Reflection on Interpersonal Relationships; Emilleo Moralez Baldizan, Milahd Makooi, and Dane Stickney.- Empowering Young Women in STEM: Participatory Action Research in Marginalized Metropolitan Areas of São Paulo, Brazil; Anna Julia Lima da Silva, Lorrany de Souza Miranda, Loruhama Cotrim dos Santos, Larissa dos Santos Henrique, Suzy Sayuri Sassamoto Kurokawa, and Luís Paulo de Carvalho Piassi.- Changing Readers’ Relationships: School-based Participatory Action Research to Empower and Engage Young Readers through Reading as Social Practice; Deborah Upchurch.- The Schoolyard Reforestation Project: Building Youth Environmental Leadership through Participatory Action Research and Cross-Age Mentorship; Anne Corkery and Lauren Hill.- Camaraderie in Research: Mingling Students’ and Teacher Voices in a Participatory Action Research Project in a Grade 5 Mathematics Classroom; Shari Smith-Ellis.- Developing a ‘disc golf’ Programme to Support Physical Activity and Socialization in SEND (Special Education Needs and Disabilities) Students Following Covid-19: A Case of Youth Participatory Action Research by a Canadian High School Student; Michael Pierre Keshav King, Phillip Whitehead, and Veena Auruna King.- Part IV - Ethics, challenges and opportunities in participatory action research with children.- Reflections from the Clarkston Youth Mobility Summer Institute; Allen Hyde, Jennifer Hirsch, and AJ Kim.- The Attempt to Step Back: Reflections on shared decision-making in Participatory Action Research with young people in Germany; Nadja Althaus and Julian Storck-Odabasi.- Reflections on the Ethics of Youth Participation in Urban Governance and Planning: A Perspective from Sweden; Romina Rodela.- The Youth Research Academy: Lessons From a Model Of Engaging Youth with Child Welfare Experience in all Aspects of the Research that Affects Them; Annie Smith, Katie Horton, Evelyn McGowan, and Maya Peled.- Navigating Youth-Led Participatory Action Research: Reflections on Ethics, Processes, and Lessons Learned from International Child and Youth Activism Projects; Sarah Ciotti, Vanessa Zufelt, Tara Collins, and Steven Gibson.- Lessons Learned and Challenges from the Inter-American Children's Institute in Promoting Participation Through the Leadership of Children and Adolescents; Alejandra Brand, Dulce Vega, and María Yegros.