Children’s Research Highlights Poverty As Key Barrier To Educational Achievement

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Children’s Research Highlights Poverty As Key Barrier To Educational Achievement

Research published by Joseph Rowntree Foundation show that children believe that poverty significantly reduces their educational prospects and limits their future life chances.

As part of the first phase of a major new programme on Education and Poverty the Joseph Rowntree Foundation trained two groups of 11 year olds in UK primary schools to carry out their own research projects into aspects of literacy that are important to them. The researchers trained two groups of six children. One group was from a school in an area with a high socio-economic status and one from a school in a disadvantaged area. This enabled the research to focus on the children’s perspective on links between education and poverty . The children were trained to develop their own research studies, which looked specifically at reading and writing proficiency, and six case studies have been produced from the research.

The findings from the children’s research studies found that confidence played a major role in educational achievement. The children from the socio-economically advantaged area were very confident in their literacy abilities with 100% of girls and 88% of boys rating their reading as very good. The research found that children from both schools had less confidence in their writing abilities. A key finding that the research highlighted was that children were concerned about literacy activities which required ‘public confidence’ including writing and reading aloud and valued the opportunity to build up private confidence in these areas by being able to practice on their own. The research found that children from advantaged backgrounds had more opportunities to practise their reading and writing at home including quiet environments to do their homework, more opportunities to talk about literacy and support from their parents. Children from the disadvantaged area had less space to do their homework, received less help from their parents and also faced more distractions including loud music, TV, banging and swearing. The research found that three quarters of children from the school in the disadvantaged area attended a homework club in order to get help with their homework as they could not get this at home. Based on their findings the child researchers came up with the idea that older children could read to younger children in the school in order to increase their confidence in reading aloud which would also benefit the younger children.

The findings from the research show that homework clubs are vital to helping children from poorer backgrounds to improve their educational achievement. The research recommends that homework clubs are accessible to children from deprived backgrounds who need them most and that they provide a quiet space where children can practise their reading and writing in order to develop their confidence in their literacy abilities. The findings from the research also show that personalised learning is very important and that children need to have the space to take ownership of their learning. The research recommends the provision in the classroom of opportunities for children to read quietly and the facilitation of private writing opportunities. Other recommended actions include using Extended School’s services to offer parents training to support their children with literacy and to develop initiatives to address literacy gaps for children and parents.

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Press Release

Children Researching Links Between Poverty and Literacy*

Posted on Monday, September 10, 2007 (Archive on Monday, September 17, 2007)
Posted by Editor Contributed by Editor

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