Kindness: caring for self, others and nature - who cares and why?
- Submitting institution
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The University of Cumbria
- Unit of assessment
- 23 - Education
- Output identifier
- HayesT1
- Type
- C - Chapter in book
- DOI
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- Book title
- Children, Young People and Care
- Publisher
- Routledge, London, UK
- ISBN
- 9781138920880
- Open access status
- Out of scope for open access requirements
- Month of publication
- -
- Year of publication
- 2017
- URL
-
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- Yes
- Number of additional authors
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0
- Research group(s)
-
-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- The inquiry and research process was driven by the author’s first-hand experiences of being an environmental youth worker, which highlighted the need for more effective practice, especially when working with young people who may be defined as being disadvantaged and/or marginalised. In recent years there has been a transformation in the scope and range of projects (both within and outside of schools) available to young volunteers, to include more of a focus on social action and community cohesion, sustainable development, climate change, regeneration, health and wellbeing. It is vital to find out from young people what they think about these experiences and to consider how effective they are. To do this, a collaborative study was undertaken with community-based organisations, which considered a range of facilitated programmes across England that offered learning opportunities outdoors. Young people’s perceptions of their experiences were explored as well as those of the educators who designed and/or delivered the programmes.
The aim of the research was twofold. First, to identify effective ways of addressing concerns about both the health and wellbeing of children, and that of our environment, aligned to contemporary issues such as childhood obesity, poor mental health, and lack of engagement with/poor understanding of the natural world. Secondly, to disseminate findings in an accessible way to practitioners, as well as academics, to encourage critically creative conversations - with ourselves (through reflection) and with others. The research took an innovative, storied approach (Hayes and Prince, 2019), drawing on transdisciplinary methods that view knowledge from disciplines relevant to specific research issues (Leavy, 2016), seeing this as a holistic process that requires creativity, looking at, and thinking about things in a different way, with the purpose of doing things differently. This output demonstrates this approach, focusing on kindness, one of the key findings from the inquiry.
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -