Childhood Today

Alex Owen, Alex Owen

• Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781526425775
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Early Childhood Education

"This is an urgently needed book that explores a number of different concepts of childhood in 21st century. The book throughout considers enduring topics and new concepts of childhood, and initiates a number of questions that students of education, childhood and early childhood studies can engage as lines of inquiries. The book offers a multidisciplinary approach of the child today, that influences practice, policy, and education, and offers diverse dimensions to provoke our thinking." - Dr. Ioanna Palaiologou, Institute of Education, University College London

How we understand what 'childhood' means in today's society is constantly changing, and the rate of this change is unprecedented. This new edited book explores what it really means to be a child of the 21 st century, and how we as professionals, researchers, parents and adults can understand an environment seemingly in constant flux.

Each chapter seeks to explore and problematise some of the different 'labels' that we give to children in an attempt to understand their contemporary experiences. From the Regulated Child to the Stressed Child to the Poor Child the book covers a wide array of key issues in contemporary childhood, including obesity, risk, special needs, wellbeing and poverty.

The pace of change in childhood can be daunting but this book helps students, practitioners and researchers to explore and understand the variety of issues affecting children in the UK and all over the world.

1 The Cotton Wool Child

Zoi Nikiforidou

Chapter Objectives

• To explore issues related to safeguarding and ‘over’ protection.
• To underline how and why risk is a vital part of child development.
• To endorse the transition from the cotton wool child to the ‘risk literate’ child.
• To unpick the notion of risk literacy.

Risk and challenge are fundamental components of child development and well-being. Yet concerns for danger, injury, and the threat of modern societies have led to an increase in regulation and provision intending to ensure secure, risk-free environments. Nevertheless, the confrontation of risk does not only lie in adults’ experience but is also a lifelong skill that may be fostered from early childhood through risk literacy. The aim of this chapter is to explore the position of risk in children’s contemporary lives by drawing on the controversy between the cotton wool child and the ‘risk expert’ (Adams, 2006). It is proposed that besides safeguarding, there should be invested interest in supporting children to develop their own risk awareness and understanding of risk. Such implications signpost the importance of setting the foundations for risk literate children as present and future citizens in a sustainable, multimodal world.

Current trends and realities

In recent times, modern society has become a risk society in the sense that it is increasingly occupied with debating, preventing and managing the risks it has produced (Beck, 2006). New technology, socially-driven realities, increased urbanisation and mobility, environmental factors and various other ‘stressors’ characterise not only our own but also young children’s lives. In response, adults try to guard and constrain any potential threats by providing young children with safe and stable environments. As such, in the majority world we frequently refer to the cotton wool child: the child who is wrapped up, by adults, as a fragile and precious parcel so as to be protected from any harm or danger. In this scenario, the adult undertakes the role of being the protector and guardian of young children, knowing and deciding for their needs, desires and best interests. In regard to child safeguarding or danger alerts or viewing children as vulnerable, immature, inexperienced and young (Munro, 2011), with ‘specific’ needs and rights to be met, adults carry out their responsibility as a duty of care and protection.

Case Study 1.1 Exploring UK policy

The extracts below, from UK policy documents on safeguarding young children, illustrate the significance of safeguarding, the role of adults and the role of children in shaping a child-centred approach.

4. Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children is defined for the purposes of this guidance as: protecting children from maltreatment; preventing impairment of children’s health or development; ensuring that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care; and taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes.

(Source: DfE (2016) Keeping Children Safe in Education: Statutory Guidance for Schools and Colleges. London: DfE. p. 8.)

2. Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children is everyone’s responsibility. Everyone who comes into contact with children and their families and carers has a role to play in safeguarding children. In order to fulfil this responsibility effectively, all professionals should make sure their approach is child-centred. This means that they should consider, at all times, what is in the best interests of the child.

(Source: DfE (2016) Keeping Children Safe in Education: Statutory Guidance for Schools and Colleges. London: DfE. p. 8.)

22. Children want to be respected, their views to be heard, to have stable relationships with professionals built on trust and to have consistent support provided for their individual needs. This should guide the behaviour of professionals. Anyone working with children should see and speak to the child; listen to what they say; take their views seriously; and work with them collaboratively when deciding how to support their needs. A child-centred approach is supported by: the Children Act 1989 … the Equality Act 2010 … the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC).

(Source: DfE (2015) Working Together to Safeguard Children: A Guide to Inter-agency Working to Safeguard and Promote the Welfare of Children. London: DfE. p. 10.)

In response to policy, on many occasions adults tend to make decisions and inflict on children particular activities and lifestyles that are ‘safe’ and ‘secure’ through ‘strict’ regulations. They raise children under certain ‘do’s and don’ts’ by attempting to control any possible source of harm, injury or risk. This overprotective attitude leads to one end of the spectrum, that of excessive regulations and policies where a ‘no risk culture’ is embedded. Bundy et al. (2009) highlight that this ‘no risk’ is a risk itself as it distorts and limits children’s freedom to play by having negative implications for their well-being and growth. As a result, children have very little time to themselves and experience increasing adult surveillance. Wyver et al. (2010) agree that there is an overloaded ‘surplus safety’ today. Children are wrapped up in a blanket of caution, with limited occurrences for experimentation with the unknown. Their play and free time become supervised and monitored and their sense of adventure, freedom and inventiveness tends to be condensed; not just in the house, or the classroom, but in most places where children can be, for example, in playgrounds and in ‘child friendly’ public spaces.

In an attempt to explain this route of overprotection, Furedi (2005) refers to the crisis of adult identity. He questions the meaning of adulthood, especially in relation to children today. He argues that in some cases adults are viewed as a threat to children. There is a ‘do not trust adults/strangers’ attitude which in a way is misanthropic. There is this negative, mistaken predisposition in individualistic societies that adults cannot help but only abuse children. The sense of community or collectivism is vanishing and because of adult insecurities there seems to be a growing distance between adults and children. Adults tend to become estranged from children and have reached the point where, when children have problems, they are no longer sure if they should be involved in children’s lives.

Nonetheless, even if matters are not at this extreme level, as Furedi (2005) implies, can systems and adult-driven decisions always eliminate risks? What about the cotton wool children themselves, their voices and their agency? Why, instead of overprotection, can’t we trust children to work out their own risks? Why don’t we support children in taking safe risks and initiatives?

Are children risk experts?

Adams (2006) mentioned that we are all true risk experts, in the sense that we have all been trained by practice in the management of risk. The development of our expertise in coping with uncertainty begins from infancy when we learn to crawl, walk, talk, ride a bicycle, handle sharp items and so on. Through trial and error processes, driven by curiosity and enjoyment, young children, like adults, perform a balancing act between the expected rewards of their actions against the perceived costs of their failures. Adam...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Publisher Note
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Acknowledgements
• Contents
• About the Editor and Contributors
• Foreword
• Acknowledgements
• Praise for the Book
• Introduction
• 1 The Cotton Wool Child
• 2 The Selfish Child
• 3 The Universal Child
• 4 The SEN/D Child
• 5 The Regulated Child
• 6 The Stressed Child
• 7 The Political Child
• 8 The Natural Child
• 9 The Poor Child
• 10 The Fat Child
• Index