Participatory Pedagogy in Practice: Using effective participatory pedagogy in classroom practice to enhance pupil voice and educational engagement.

The UK Government requires all schools in England to promote ‘Fundamental British Values’. These include democracy, and as Hart (1992) states: ‘A nation is democratic to the extent that its citizens are involved’. My research questions how ’involved’ pupils are within schools and how democratic our schools are. Recent findings from Robinson (2014) found that pupil participation in schools is not as effective as believed. Hart (1992) developed a Ladder of Participation to illustrate the levels of participation and non-participation of young people in
schools. This has been used for developing and enhancing the work of school councils for many years, though arguably much of the work can still remain around the lower, tokenistic ‘consultation’ levels. My research aims to explore pupil participation and voice within the classroom, and within teaching itself.
Education has the potential to be socially transformative when that education system actively recognises and engages the learners as agents for their own learning. James and Pollard (2011) argue that pedagogy could influence social aspects such as increased social justice or economic prosperity. Further to that I would argue that engaging in a transformative, ‘participatory’ pedagogy utilises critical, creative and collaborative thinking to greater effect, enabling learners to become ‘transformers of their world’ (Freire, 1968, cited in Robinson & Taylor, 2007: 12). Through this research I have been able to develop a Participatory Pedagogy Framework based on Hart’s ‘Ladder of Participation’ (1992) and, by incorporating the work of Florian and Linklater (2010), adapt it for use within general classroom practice as an approach to developing pupil voice and engagement in learning. My paper will endeavour to outline the key aspects of the theory around the development of my Participatory Pedagogy Framework and the initial outcomes from a small-scale action research project exploring the educational effectiveness and practicality of employing the framework in a primary classroom.