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Thematic Area: Children participation and design

Involving children in the design process can bring a wealth of advantages to built environment projects, empowering the children and creating a sense of ownership. While adults may build places for children such as playgrounds, these places may not meet children’s needs. Children should therefore be actively involved in designing and planning spaces that are meant for children.

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Children’s Participation in the Context of Forced Migration

This paper highlights the challenges of involving children in the context of forced migration. Carrying out participatory research in refugee camps is extremely difficult for a huge range of reasons, but involving children can be particularly problematical. This paper outlines the reasons for this, but also highlights why it is so important to involve people…
  • Publication year: 2001
  • Content Type: Academic paper
Recommended

Making Spaces for Children. Planning for Post-Disaster Reconstruction with Children and Their Families

This report explains why is important – in contest of crisis – to involve children and families in the planning of their physical living environment, and how to do it. This handbook aims at contributing to disaster response reconstruction programmes that not only rebuild the physical living environment but that strengthen the capacity of communities…
  • Publication year: 2006
  • Content Type: Report
Recommended

Places for Children – Children’s Places

This article highlights the difference between places created by adults for children (places for children) and spaces that children themselves consider to be play spaces (children’s places). This is an important concept to keep in mind when co-designing social infrastructures with and for children. In their everyday lives, children largely stay within and relate to…
  • Publication year: 2004
  • Content Type: Academic paper
Recommended

The Benefits of Participatory Evaluation for Children and Youth

This study shows how involving young people in participatory projects has a profound impact on the projects and on the children involved. This paper looks at four different projects working with children in the USA, and the results and information that was gathered as a result of young peoples participatory evaluation of the programmes.
  • Publication year: 2001
  • Content Type: Academic paper

Youth-Centred Design Toolkit

The Youth-Centred Design Toolkit provides tools and techniques to include child and youth voices in the development of meaningful programming that reflects the real needs of today’s kids. This Youth-Centred Design (YCD) Toolkit helps teams of colleagues, children, youth, their families or caregivers and organizational partners explore and design solutions together. The YCD toolkit has…
  • Content Type: Toolkit

Practice Standards in Children’s Participation

The report provides a framework and operational guidelines for field workers who want to support children’s participation. The seven standards discussed are: An ethical approach –  transparency, honesty and accountability; Children’s participation is relevant and voluntary; A child-friendly, enabling environment; Equality of opportunity; Staff are effective and confident; Participation promotes the safety and protection of…
  • Publication year: 2005
  • Content Type: Report

Diseño Participativo de Espacios Públicos con Perspectiva de Infancia

This document presents the value of participatory methodologies to integrate girls, boys and adolescents’ knowledge and perceptions, as an input for the design of urban public spaces. The experience of the Sustainable Urban Development Centre (CEDEUS) in Villa Marta Brunet (Puente Alto, Santiago, Chile) as a case.
  • Publication year: 2019
  • Content Type: Toolkit

The Children of Kabul – Discussions with Afghan Families

The study explores three main topics : well-being goals for Afghan children; the threats children face in achieving well-being; and the coping resources children already have for dealing with their difficulties.The findings of the research are relevant for all who seek to provide assistance to Afghan children – and war-affected children worldwide – as they…
  • Publication year: 2003
  • Content Type: Report

Children and Young People’s Participation (CYPP) Training Workshop Guide

This manual is designed to support organisations to promote children and young people’s participation and inclusion in project planning, implementation and evaluation. This manual helps facilitate dialogue and an exchange of ideas between the organisation’s staff and the adults and children involved. The training programme also allows to train a team of the staff, adults…
  • Publication year: 2013
  • Content Type: Toolkit

Landscape as Playscape: The Effects of Natural Environments on Children’s Play and Motor Development

This study investigated the impacts of playing in a natural environment on motor development in children. A quasi-experimental study was conducted on five-, six-, and seven-year old children with an experimental group playing in a natural environment and a control group playing in a more traditional playground. When provided with a natural landscape in which…
  • Publication year: 2004
  • Content Type: Academic paper

Youth Participation Best Practices Toolkit: Part II

This is the second part of the Youth Participation Toolkit, coordinated by Save the Children. It contains tools, methods, tips, exercises, and training workshops for improving youth participation. The Education for Youth Empowerment (EYE) programme targets a relatively wide age group, 12-24 year olds, in various countries. The toolkit is rather generic so prospective users…
  • Publication year: 2016
  • Content Type: Toolkit

Qualitative Research on Children’s Play: A Review of Recent Literature

This book chapter is a review of the recent, English-language qualitative research on children’s play. It focuses on the place play has in children’s experience and giving sense to the world. Thus, it will leave aside the large and important body of research on the effect or outcomes (benefits and possible harmful consequences) of play…
  • Publication year: 2007
  • Content Type: Book

Don’t Just Listen- Do Something! Lessons Learned about Governance from the Growing Up in Cities Project

Eight practitioners in the Growing Up in Cities project of UNESCO reflect on what they have learned in terms of how to move government officials and leaders of civil society to view children and youth as partners in creating livable cities. They describe their experience in participatory action research with children and youth, how they…
  • Publication year: 2005
  • Content Type: Academic paper

PASSA Youth: Participatory Approach for Safe Shelter and Settlements Awareness

This manual is for use by National Societies of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) wishing to use PASSA Youth in their programmes. The Participatory Approach for Safe Shelter Awareness (PASSA) is a methodology, implemented in partnership with Habitat for Humanity International, that aims to provide young people aged between…
  • Publication year: 2016
  • Content Type: Toolkit

Children Changing Their World: Understanding and Evaluating Children’s Participation in Development

The report is the result of research into the impact of children’s participation on development programmes and how such participation can be facilitated. It brings together the findings of a literature review of current thinking about children’s participation and its evaluation with a field study undertaken in three different countries (Ecuador, India and Kenya). It…
  • Publication year: 2004
  • Content Type: Report

Listen and Learn: Participatory Assessment with Children and Adolescents

This Tool sets out some specific considerations to be taken into account when working with girls and boys. It suggests a new approach to participatory assessments for children and adolescents. It describes the need for an ethical approach to participatory assessment and sets out the elements of such an approach. After providing some tips on…
  • Publication year: 2012
  • Content Type: Toolkit

Young Children’s Rights: Exploring Beliefs, Principles and Practice

This book examines how children’s rights as set out in the UNCRC applies to young children (0-8 years old). It discusses how to find a balance between children’s provision, protection and participation rights, especially when adults consider that they are looking out for a child’s ‘best interest’ they become overprotective and deny children their right…
  • Publication year: 2008
  • Content Type: Book

Restoring Playfulness: Different Approaches to Assisting Children Who Are Psychologically Affected by War and Displacement

This book is divided into two parts. The first part provides an overview of key themes and issues related to refugee children including their experiences, the importance of culture, play, parenting and school for their recovery, the need for timely intervention and strategies to achieve maximum impact. The second part presents seven case studies conducted…
  • Publication year: 1996
  • Content Type: Book

A City for All Citizens: Integrating Children and Youth from Marginalized Populations into City Planning

Socially just, intergenerational urban spaces should not only accommodate children and adolescents, but engage them as participants in the planning and design of welcoming spaces. With this goal, city agencies in Boulder, Colorado, the Boulder Valley School District, the Children, Youth and Environments Centre at the University of Colorado, and a number of community organizations…
  • Publication year: 2013
  • Content Type: Academic paper

Empowering Marginalised Children in Developing Countries Through Participatory Design Processes

In this paper, a theoretical platform for developing a design methodology for participatory design with underprivileged children in developing countries is presented. The framework consists of an explanation of psychological empowerment in the context of participatory design processes, a definition of participatory design with children, and a model distinguishing between different levels of user participation.…
  • Publication year: 2010
  • Content Type: Academic paper

Children in Conflict Situations: Applying Childhood Research with a Focus on the Early Years

This chapter talks about the limited applied research conducted with young children in times of conflict and displacement even thought the impacts on them are very high. Young children’s development is affected, their mental health. Young children are especially at risk when parents or caregivers cannot provide them with adequate protection due to their own…
  • Publication year: 2016
  • Content Type: Book

Living Through and Living On?

In this article, we examine the school project implemented by the architecture charity CatalyticAction in the informal refugee settlement of Jarahieh, in the Bekaa, Lebanon. In doing so, we propose an approach to participatory humanitarian architecture that extends beyond the mere act of designing “together” an “object building.” We see participatory architecture as a process…
  • Publication year: 2020
  • Content Type: Academic paper

Sen’s Capability Approach: Children and Well-Being Explored Through the Use of Photography

This book chapter explores the utility of Sen’s capability approach with primary school children in the UK. Photo-voice is used as a participatory approach using photographs to elicit discussions around the photographic stimulus. It is employed with children to engage with them and to capture alternative creative framings of wellbeing and capabilities.
  • Publication year: 2011
  • Content Type: Book

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DeCID: Co-designing social infrastructure with children affected by displacement is a project led by The Bartlett Development Planning Unit (UCL) and CatalyticAction, and funded by UKRI through the Global Challenges Research Fund.

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