The desire to better understand school life from a pupil perspective became more prevalent in the late 1960s and 1970s with studies like that of Meighan (1977) which acknowledged that at that time 'The research available on the pupils' point of view regarding schooling is limited,' a view echoed by LeCompte et al (1992). Through the 1990s and onwards, interest in the child's perspective has increased, stimulated by political encouragement through initiatives like the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989 (ratified by the UK in 1991), creation of Children's Commissioners in London and Wales (in 2000 and 2001 respectively), creation of the Children and Young People's Unit and more recently through the Every Child Matters (2004) agenda.
In trying to bring order to the differing pressures from these political agendas, Clarke et al (2003) identified three levels from which the pupil voice can be approached:
In Tangen's 2008 study 'Listening to children’s voices,' three levels or aspects of meaning were attributed to the action of listening:
She also raises the issue of 'insider epistemology' or as Fay (1996) put it 'Do you have to be one to know one?' In other words in order to be able to understand what the experiences of a child are, do you have to be one? And therefore what tensions does this create for an adult researcher exploring the experiences of children? A possible way forward might be to involve the pupils as co-researchers as identified by Clarke and Moss (2001) and Greig et al (2007) and in so doing allowing their voice to emerge authentically.
A major investigation into pupil voice in recent years was undertaken by Rudduck et al (2001-2003) which sought to explore the process of consultation, its impact on those involved and its effect on teaching, learning and organisation practices. Co-ordinating six projects across 43 schools, it too made significant use of pupil-researchers, often working together with their teachers. A significant feature of the project was the way in which emerging data was fed back into the system to guide improvements in teaching and learning, together with strengthening of school policy.
Engaging pupils in dialogue about different aspects of their school life brings with it a variety of advantages:
(Rudduck & Flutter, 2004)
Fielding and Bragg (2003) noticed one cautionary note in that 'Young people and adults often have quite different views of what is significant or important in the experience of and hopes for learning. Even when they identify similar issues as important, they can mean quite different things by them.'