Digital Approaches for Gathering Student Opinions in School

This project explores digital technology to ascertain student opinion on outside spaces in schools.

Digital Approaches for Gathering Student Opinions in School

This project is a collaboration between Denise Lengyel and Ahmed Kharrufa from Open Lab, and Pamela Woolner and Alison Whelan from the School of Education, Communication and Language Sciences at Newcastle University. It is funded by the UK government's Department for Education. 

18 students from year 9-13 and teaching and technology staff at a local high school and middle school in the North East of England were involved in the study. They were interviewed, and took part in focus groups using map-based visual methods and drawing. Three digital methods were also trialled for gathering feedback (online questionnaires, PosterVote and Sticker Stories) at these schools, and two additional schools in the West Midlands. 

This project helped us to learn what is important to students about outdoor space (their likes and dislikes) and which technologies the students would like to use when being asked about their opinion (individual, group-based /collaborative discussion, location-based). It also revealed the barriers and benefits of using such technologies in schools and how students engage with them. 

What impact did it have?   

A research report containing the findings from this project was published by the UK government’s Department for Education. It is called “Developing a method for obtaining pupil insight for Building in Use reviews: the use and value of external school space” and can be downloaded here. We also published two conference papers at ECER and BERA 2024, see below for more details.