Abstract This study examined young children’s and their teachers’ perceptions of war. The participants were consisted of 107 local children ages ranging from 5 to 8 year old and 8 teachers from Al Ain, United Arab Emirates (UAE). Semi-structured interviews were conducted with children and teachers to collect the data. Prior to interviews with children, this study utilized children’s drawings in an effort to discern what children’s perceptions of war were. The data was analyzed using a phenomenological procedure. Although the majority of children could not articulate details of the specific nature of war, they indicated that war was bad for morally relevant reasons. This study also demonstrated age and gender related differences in children’s understanding of war. Participant teachers in the current study stated negative attitudes toward war and could not justify why wars happen; and, reported that they did not cover this topic unless it was emerged from children. This study was vital for young children in UAE as it provided opportunities for youngsters to explore their feelings; provided useful information to those engaged in early childhood and elementary education in UAE to promote peace education and to provide curriculum guidance for teaching social studies. Description of the paper – e.g. topic, research question, objective, purpose, value, conceptual or theoretical framework, state of the art: “Children practically everywhere in the world today have grown up in an atmosphere of violence. What do they think about the concept of war? How have their views been developed? What can and should adults do in educating children for peace?” [1]

These opening statements and questions of the Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI)’s position paper on children and war led the researcher to investigate the young children’s and their teachers’ perceptions of war in United Arab Emirates (UAE), a country in Middle East region where armed conflicts seem to occur very often. Although children in this country are protected from the direct influences of war, it is evident in research that no matter how far children may be from the war, they might be influenced by the war indirectly, mostly through media channels. Children generally form their perceptions at an early stage of their development and these perceptions at an early age tends to be based largely on the perceptions of the attitudes of adults and peer groups in the social environment, as well as on messages received through the media channels [2]. To help children develop appropriate perceptions of war and to make practical recommendations to teachers of these young children, it is very vital to understand how these young children and their teachers perceive war. Specifically, the researcher was guided in this study by the following questions: 1. How do young Emirati children aged 5 to 8 years perceive war? 2. What are the primary sources of young Emirati children's information about the war? 3. How do young Emirati children’s perception of war and the primary sources of their information about the war wary with age and gender? 4. How do teachers of young children in UAE perceive war? 5. How do teachers of young children in UAE handle the issue of war in their classrooms? Answers to these questions are useful in terms of providing curriculum guidance for teaching social studies, specifically peace education and civics, to young children in early childhood programs as well as early elementary grades in UAE. It is vital for teachers in these programs to understand what their students are capable of and ready for [3]. The body of research examining children’s perception, understanding, conception of, or view on war (often, unlike this study, including their view of peace as well) can be considered very extensive, and most of which now can be considered very old, [4]-[5]-[6]-[7]-[8]-[9]-[3]-[10]-[11]. For a comprehensive review of most of these studies, see Hakvoort and Oppenheimer [12]. The purpose of this study was to investigate how both children and their teachers in UAE perceive war, with the practical aim of obtaining information helpful to promote peace education and to provide curriculum guidance for teaching social studies, specifically peace education and civics, in kindergarten programs as well as in early elementary grades Sample The participants of this study are consisted of 107 local (Emirati) children ages ranging from 5 to 8 year old and 8 classroom teachers, with different educational, professional, and national backgrounds. Children participated in this study were attending kindergarten, 1st grade and 2nd grade in a private school in Al Ain, UAE. No learning, behavior or developmental problems were reported for those children who participated in this study by the teachers and school administration. Since the sample size was not very large for making comparisons, it was intended to have a similar number of children from different age groups and both genders. Design The data for this study was collected through children’s drawings and semi-structured interviews with children and semi-structured interviews with teachers. Analysis The data was analyzed using a phenomenological procedure. At the end of the interview and drawing sessions, the researcher went through all of the drawings and notes to get a ‘feel’ of what is being said, identifying key themes in each drawing. Based on the framework provided by the questions and results of the interviews, the findings were categorized into groups. When sorting the data, the researcher first examined the similarities among the subjects’ drawings and responses, and then analyzed the differences in general. The same procedures were followed for the analysis of teacher interviews.

Data obtained from children who participated in this study highlighted some age-related differences. It is evident in this study that children’s perception of war starts to develop at around or after age 6. Furthermore, this data also draw attention to other age-related differences, showing 5- and 6-year olds being unable to picture and describe anything about war and 7- and 8-yeard olds picturing and mentioning armed conflicts, especially 8-year olds depicting written statements and emotional reactions in their pictures and explaining detailed causes and consequences of war in their verbal responses. These conceptions appeared to be parallel to children’s development of societal knowledge [5]. Furthermore, as children's cognitive abilities develop, their emotional and behavioral reactions change accordingly [16]. Older children tend to be more rational in their thought processes and better informed of events [17]. Current study also highlighted some gender differences in children’s perception of war and in their sources of knowledge about war, showing that 1) boys are more interested in war and more concerned with war related issues; 2) boys now more about weapons; and, 3) girls are primarily concerned about the consequences of war, whereas boys are more concerned about elements of war. These differences appear to reflect attitudes [5], emotional responses and moral judgments [6], and can be explained by appealing to traditional gender stereotypes, or to the female tendency to show a greater concern [5]. Early socialization of gender roles seems to be crucial in children's development of attitudes toward war. In children’s play we can observe that boys may be exposed to aggressive games more often whereas dependency and emotional responsiveness may be more frequently fostered in girls [17]. The present study also demonstrated that, through the self-reports of children to their source of war knowledge, parental influence seems to be the most significant factor affecting children’s perception of war. Children’s perception of war found to be strongly related to parental attitudes. And even where most knowledge may be derived from the media through the repeated exposure to violence and armed conflicts, it could be argued that parents may have much control over the quantity and quality of the information available to the children. Mass media also seemed to be influential in children’s perception of war, especially TV as being important source of information, but not as influential as parents or family members. It can be discussed that children receive most of their information from TV, but parents and family members seem to be the ones who interpret children what TV provides. Moreover, the data obtained from the teachers, although is very limited, highlights that actual discussion of wars and related issues, unless comes from the children, does not seem to occur very often in schools for young children. This study confirms the findings of Tolley [14] that teachers avoid such matters, either because of concern to shelter children from the stress of these matters or because of reluctance to result in parent and even community. It would not be too wrong if is said that Emirati children might have natural interest in what they constantly see and hear reports about the conflict on media as they have friends who comes from the countries where war happens. But despite this possible interest in current happenings in Middle-East region, teachers may be understandably hesitant to approach the conflict in even from a peace perspective. Teachers report that classroom time is typically limited by concerns for the coverage of more traditional content. They believe it is better for children if the controversial issues such as war are left alone. This is perhaps because of the lack of training to teach and discuss controversial issues with children. Conclusions This study was vital for young children in UAE as it provided opportunities for youngsters to explore their feelings; provided useful information to those engaged in early childhood and elementary education in UAE. A clearer understanding of young children’s perceptions of war has implications for the teachers of young children. Once teachers know what perceptions children may possess, they can modify their teaching of social studies and civics to promote social skills that value peaceful conflict resolution, tolerance and non-aggression. Once they have a firm understanding of children’s perception of war, teachers of young children might have daily opportunities to model peaceful interactions with students. As noted by Lasser and Adams [18], compromise, collaboration, active listening and demonstration of empathy serve as positive examples for these young children. If children are to be educated to be peacemakers, Islam might play a significant role in achieving the peace as it serves as a moral and spiritual force in UAE society. Teaching of morals of Islam in UAE schools might help Emirati children to understand and accept the idea that war is not an acceptable way to deal with human conflict. Early childhood and elementary teacher educators may also benefit from the findings of this study as it provided information regarding the early childhood and elementary education teachers’ perceptions of war and how they deal with issues such as war. This information is also helpful for teacher educators to modify their teacher training programs to meet the needs of future teachers of young children. This can be achieved by preparing future teachers about teaching strategies dealing effectively with controversial issues such as war and by providing a supportive atmosphere to encourage confidence to become fully engaged in teaching of controversial issues. Teacher education programs have the potential to help the pre-service and in-service teachers to explore the connections between prejudices, value systems, social inequality, school memories, political agendas, violence, and community when students are introduced to peacemaking in teaching of social skills and the building of caring classroom communities [19]. This researcher believes in a more open communicative climate should be developed among families, the community and schools with an increased attention to the coverage of wars in the media and how our children perceive what they see and hear. Peace needs to be promoted at home, within the community, at the level of educational policy makers, and across borders. Schools and teachers alone cannot solve the world’s problems, but in collaboration with families, community, people involved in education of these young children directly or indirectly, professional organizations, and with mass media, we have the potential to promote peace and help children to understand that we are all living under the same roof, and we need each other to live together under this roof.