CYS-facilitated workshop to provide decision-makers with young people's insights

King’s will be hosting Shaking the Movers for the first time in London, on November 12, 2021. The workshop will take place virtually from 10 a.m. – 3:15 p.m. and is supported by generous donations from the Landon Pearson Centre and the John M Davitsky Foundation.

Young people aged 8-12 years old will work with King’s students as they engage in various rights-based activities developed by CYS students. Through these activities, young people will share their thoughts, ideas and suggestions about how to make their community a better place as they consider aspects of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child in the context of their lived experiences. The young people’s key ideas, insights, and recommendations will be captured in a report (developed by a student), to be read, and responded to, by decision-makers from across Canada at a Conference at Carleton University in Ottawa in February. Additional follow-up activities will be led by CYS.

Since the beginning of the semester, students from CYS have worked to develop the workshop’s key themes and rights-based activities which they will facilitate in the workshop; activities will be interactive, child-friendly, and arts-based. The CYS students will have the opportunity to gain hands-on experience working directly with young people and to develop skills in facilitation while applying a rights-based approach to working with young people.

“The workshop will aim to get young people (8-12 years old) thinking about what advocacy skills they currently posses and what skills they might like to develop to make a difference in their communities. It’s a process for young peoples voices to be listened to, valued, and heard by decision-makers,” says Dr. Daniella Bendo, Assistant Professor, Childhood and Youth Studies.

Shaking the Movers is an annual youth-driven and youth-led workshop series held in different regions of the country in both English and French. It will provide annual ‘high-impact’ learning opportunities that enrich Childhood and Youth Studies’ curriculum and will represent the larger orientation of the program’s advocacy and children’s rights pillar.

In March 2021, a memorandum of understanding (MOU) was signed between King’s, the Landon Pearson Resource Centre for the Study of Childhood and Children’s Rights at Carleton University. The MOU connected the CYS program at King’s with the Landon Pearson Resource Centre for the Study of Childhood and Children’s Rights to develop and bring the annual “Shaking the Movers” workshops to King’s.

The MOU was signed virtually by Dr. David Malloy, King’s President, and Dr. Bendo on March 26, 2021. From 2016-2020, Dr. Bendo worked at the Landon Pearson Centre (Carleton University) as the National Shaking the Movers Coordinator and drew on this connection to bring Shaking the Movers to King’s with support from CYS faculty and the Landon Pearson Centre. The MOU was also signed by the Honourable Landon Pearson, O.C and Dr. Virginia Caputo, the Director of the Landon Pearson Centre.

Childhood and Youth Studies, formerly Childhood and Social Institutions, analyzes childhood from an interdisciplinary perspective to look at childhood in sociological, anthropological, historical, political, cultural, and geographical contexts. The program focuses on valuing children as capable and competent beings and on highlighting the importance of young people’s voices and viewpoints.