Children's Rights Education in Diverse Classrooms - by Lee Jerome & Hugh Starkey (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

With PISA tables, accountability, and performance management pulling educators in one direction, and the understanding that education is a social process embedded in cultural contexts, tailored to meet the needs and challenges of individuals and communities in another, it is easy to end up in seeing teachers as positioned as opponents to the 'system'. Jerome and Starkey argue that the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC, 1989) can provide a pragmatic starting point for educators to challenge some of these unsettling trends in a way which does not set up unnecessary opposition with policy-makers.

They review the evidence from international evaluations, surveys and case studies about practice in human rights and child right education before exploring the key principles of transformative and experiential education to offer a robust theoretical framework that can guide the development of child rights education. They also draw out practical implications and outline a series of teaching and learning approaches that are values informed, aligned with children's rights and focused on quality learning.

Review Quotes

[P]rovides a comprehensive, humanistic framework for educators and adults who work with children, offering a guide for teachers to interrogate their roles and responsibilities within the vision of a student centered, rights-based school system while advancing scholarship in human rights education and children's rights education ... Reading this book challenged me both personally and professionally ... After finishing the book, I had a clearer vision of the teacher that I want to become and the relationship that I want to build with my students; I became filled with hope and excitement for creating my classroom that is a rights-respecting space.

International Journal of Human Rights Education

Jerome and Starkey provide the most comprehensive academic work to date articulating the relationships between children's rights, human rights, and educational efforts that seek to advance both. By centering and interrogating the role of teachers in increasingly neoliberal educational systems, the authors offer useful directions for how teacher and student agency can make children's rights education come alive in both classrooms and communities. A timely and necessary book.
Monisha Bajaj, Professor of International and Multicultural Education, University of San Francisco, USA

The book is of great value to teachers and practitioners in schools and early years settings as well as other professionals with responsibility for children's rights education.
Human Rights Education Review

About the Author

Lee Jerome is Associate Professor of Education at Middlesex University, UK. He has taught in schools, universities and NGOs for over 20 years and has also worked with a range of organisations including the Association for Citizenship Teaching, BBC and UNICEF, to support high quality education.

Hugh Starkey is Professor of Education at IOE, UCL's Faculty of Education and Society, University College London, UK. He has acted as a consultant on human rights education and intercultural education for the Council of Europe, UNESCO and the British Council.