RESUMO
The COVID-19 pandemic represented not only a health crisis, but a social crisis for children, one that has disrupted notions of what a good childhood is. However, the longer-term implications of the pandemic are still to be seen, for children, their families and communities. This article is concerned with what these ongoing changes may be, based on a qualitative multi-stage study that asks children about their experiences of well-being before the pandemic, during lockdowns and post-COVID-19 lockdowns. This included asking seven children in online semi-structured interviews about what aspects of life brought on by COVID-19 restrictions they would like to see continue post-lockdown. We outline some of our findings. We describe new rituals and ways of organising time developed by children, facilitated by the use of digital technologies. We describe these new ways of managing time as task-based rather than rule-based, with children experiencing slowness of and greater control over their time. We found that lockdowns provided a possibility for children to assert a public agency through banal acts of sociability, for example, by conforming to public health measures such as mask-wearing and hand-washing. Whilst small acts, children discussed these in terms of being moral agents (protecting the safety of others) and as part of a larger civic attitude they observed around them. Thus, their acts can be seen as expressions of larger forms of social solidarity that contributed to a sense of collective effervescence.
RESUMO
The aim of the study was to explore children's representations and perceptions of natural spaces using photovoice and community mapping. The sample consisted of 28 children aged 12-14 years residing in urban and rural communities in the Western Cape, South Africa. Data were collected by means of a series of six focus groups interviews (three photovoice discussion groups and three community mapping discussion groups). For the photovoice missions, children were provided with a 28-exposure disposable camera and given 1 week to complete their missions. Thematic analysis was employed to analyse the data. Three key themes emerged, namely: safe spaces in nature, unsafe spaces in nature, and children's favourite places in nature. Socio-economic status (SES) was found to be a determining factor in how children make sense of natural spaces. Children from low SES communities indicated being more constricted in their mobility, and were unable to access to safe natural spaces compared to the children from the middle SES community. It is recommended that an expedient starting point would be to work towards and build environmentally and child-friendly communities for children, with children as key contributors in the planning process using a child participation framework.
