Eliciting the Voice of Children and Young People in Their Education, Health and Care Plans, and Annual Reviews: Achieving Meaningful Participation
36 SEND professionals from local authorities and 16 SEND professionals from specialist schools within England were asked their views on eliciting pupil voice through an online‐based questionnaire. This was then followed up with six in‐depth semi‐structured interviews.
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Theme: Co-productive working with young people and parent/carers
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Strength: Robust
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Breadth of Impact: Good
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Status: Quality Assured
36 SEND professionals from local authorities and 16 SEND professionals from specialist schools within England were asked their views on eliciting pupil voice through an online‐based questionnaire. This was then followed up with six in‐depth semi‐structured interviews.
The author found that SEND professionals place emphasis on hearing the voice as part of the process and the majority prioritise meeting the children and young people to elicit their views. The enabling factors to elicit pupil voice were: familiar and trusted adults, preparation, adapted materials, accessible venue, patience, clear communication, and staff training to elicit voice.
This grey literature was appraised using a validated checklist. The AACODS checklist provides guidance when dealing with diverse formats of grey literature (Tyndall, 2010). AACODS includes the following items: Authority (who is responsible for the intellectual content) – Accuracy – Coverage (parameters which define the content coverage i.e., reference to a particular population group, or certain type of publication) – Objectivity (identify bias, if it is unstated or unacknowledged) – Date (that confirms relevance of information)- Significance (value judgment in the context of the relevant research area). The checklist can be used for any discipline area and prioritises expert opinion and expertise over source format (Tyndall, 2010).