The study of human rights education (HRE) has emerged in recent years, and many scholars have addressed the various definitions, pedagogical approaches, contents, and limits of such education (for an overview, see Kayum Ahmed, 2021). However, fewer HRE studies have paid specific attention to the learning processes of the schooled child as a learner of HRE. This gap in the research is surprising given the prevalence of ‘child-centred’ approaches in sociological and educational discourse (e.g., Lerkkanen et al., 2016; Parker, 2018; Power et al., 2019). The current study aims to conceptualise children’s rights learning processes in school. It focuses on rights education that explicitly concerns children’s rights. More specifically, it aims to answer the following question: What characterises rights learning processes in school when children are the learners and children’s rights is the content?

The analysis presents various features of children’s human rights education (hereafter CHRE) learning processes in school, organised into three dimensions. The first dimension highlights the individual child, whose learning is influenced by developmental and socio-cultural factors (see Vygotsky, 1978), and considers child-centred aims, content, and approaches (see Lundy & Martínez-Sainz, 2018). The second dimension accentuates the prominent role of interactions and relationships in CHRE. It is embedded in the daily interactive experiences that comprise CHRE in schools and CHRE’s underscoring of children’s participation rights and agency, which requires adults to share power (see Author 2, 2020). The third dimension emphasizes the role of the school environment as the multidimensional space where CHRE learning processes transpire (see Isenström & Quennerstedt, 2020). This dimension stresses the importance of a whole-school approach for effective CHRE (see Author 1, 2020) and the challenges that may constrain children’s ability to make sense of CHRE in school in light of gaps between CHRE aims and more traditional institutional practices (see Osler & Starkey, 2010; Author 2, 2021). Whereas these three dimensions are interconnected, the analysis aims to discern the distinctive features of each to promote a comprehensive understanding of the CHRE learning processes in school.

The prominent link between the different features of CHRE learning in school is student participation rights (UNCRC, Article 12). These rights are central in all the dimensions we conceptualised: developing child-centred content, aims, and approaches for CHRE requires participatory pedagogy, relational learning of CHRE implies reducing power gaps between educators and students, and whole-school CHRE programmes should provide children with opportunities to participate in organisational decision making. This insight aligns with the fundamental role of participation rights in the interpretation and implementation of all the other rights in the UNCRC (UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, 2009; Hanson & Lundy, 2017). It also underscores the significance of analysing CHRE as a concept embedded in the children’s rights discourse, which partly overlaps with HRE but also has distinct features.

This conceptual paper builds upon an extensive review of literature focusing on children’s human rights education for children in school. The scant literature specifically addressing HRE for children about children’s rights is analysed and critically reviewed, as well as the broader literature focusing on HRE for children. In a complementary manner, other relevant works relating to children’s rights and learning in school are drawn upon. The study is carried out as a review of literature, with the objective of “selectively discussing the literature on a particular topic to make the argument that a new study will make a new or important contribution to knowledge” (Siddaway et al., 2019, p. 750-751). Thus, the study does not aim to undertake a systematic literature review; rather, its approach leans towards Grant and Booth’s description of critical reviews that seek “to identify most significant items in the field” and provide a “conceptual contribution to embody existing or derive new theory” (2009, p. 94).

Whereas some features of CHRE learning in school have been addressed in various studies, the current study is the first scholarly endeavour to integrate them into a conceptual framework, showing how CHRE should be translated into pedagogical language and practices and adapted to children as learners in school. This framework is anchored in children’s rights and HRE narratives. It also relies on robust literature elucidating how children learn and should learn, including developmental studies, prominent educational theories, school climate, and school administration research. Thus, the conceptual framework we offer may foster the development of effective whole-school approaches to CHRE, which are intertwined with various learning processes. It may also help educators make sense of CHRE, link it to their professional foundation of pedagogical knowledge, and ultimately improve their practices.

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