Research
The Helen Hamlyn Centre for Pedagogy (0–11 years)'s research aims to transform the lives of children through exemplary pedagogy.
Children’s agency
Agency is defined as a socially situated capacity to act. This capacity is central to children’s development, and their ability to lead happy, successful lives. Evidence demonstrates that having a sense of agency and being able to exercise agency to shape learning experience contributes to children’s academic achievement and socio-emotional wellbeing.
Our research on children’s agency aims to develop a better understanding of the impact of educational policies, practices, and environments on children’s agency and its role in helping children to succeed in school and beyond.
Our research on children’s agency:
- Children’s Agency in the National Curriculum (CHANT)
- Download: Children’s Agency, Knowledge, and the Primary Curriculum (pdf)
- Children’s agency research summary for the Chartered College of Teaching’s Education Exchange
- Consultation for the Republic of Ireland National Council for Curriculum and Assessment
- What next for Curriculum?
- Leverhulme Trust: Children’s Agency and the National Curriculum
- Learner agency and the curriculum: a critical realist perspective
- Children’s agency: What is it, and what should be done?
- Living and Learning During a Pandemic
- Watch: Transforming young children’s education: towards agency and participation
- Watch: HHCP Conference 2021 Children’s Agency and the Curriculum.
- Watch: Children's agency animation
Curriculum
The curriculum is what children experience every day in their early years settings and primary schools. National curricula reflect society’s aspirations for their children and young people, and assessments is an important part of curricula.
Our research provides evidence on better ways to understand and create curriculum and assessment systems, at national levels in policy, and in schools and classrooms.
We work on curricula holistically but also in relation to curriculum areas such as language and literacy, creativity, and the arts. Children’s and teachers’ agency, through curriculum, pedagogy and assessment, are a vital focus for our work.
Our research on the curriculum includes:
Curriculum design
- Rethinking Curriculum
- Creating Curricula: Aims, Knowledge and Control
- Breadth and balance: the essential elements of a recovery curriculum
- Watch Why is a Broad and Balanced Curriculum in Early Years Settings and Primary Schools Important?
- Knowledge, Curriculum, and Pedagogy: Universality and developmental difference across educational phases
- Watch: The Teaching Instinct: Effective pedagogy for young children in homes and schools
- Watch: What if we took play more seriously in the schools system?
Language and literacy
- The Grammar and Writing Research Project
- Phonics and the teaching of reading
- Impact of the phonics screening check on Year 2
- How Writing Works: From the Invention of the Alphabet to the Rise of Social Media
- Experimental trials and ‘what works?’ in education: The case of grammar for writing
- Two-year-old and three-year-old children’s writing: the contradictions of children’s and adults’ conceptualisations
- The Good Writing Guide for Education Students
- Teaching English, Language and Literacy
- The Grammar and Writing Research Project
- Synthetic phonics and the teaching of reading
- The Balancing Act: An evidence-based approach to teaching phonics, reading and writing
Assessment
- Handbook of Curriculum, Pedagogy and Assessment
- Oral evidence given to the House of Commons Education Committee
- The Phonics Screening Check – why all the fuss?
- The datafication of primary and early years education
- Intervention culture, grouping and triage: high-stakes tests and practices of division in English primary schools
- Separating primary school children in preparation for SATs could be ‘damaging’
Creativity and the arts
- Why the arts should be at the heart of a recovery curriculum covered in Nursery World
- Creativity and Education: Comparing the national curricula of the states of the European Union with the United Kingdom
- All is not lost in the art of creative writing
- Learning About Culture
- Using picture books and illustration to improve pupil’s literacy
- Teachers working directly with professional writers, learning techniques they can apply in the classroom
- Using drama and storytelling to develop pupils’ communication skills
- Providing pupils with a meaningful purpose for writing and teaching specific writing techniques
- Educating young children through daily singing
Children’s and teachers’ agency
- Consultation for the Republic of Ireland National Council for Curriculum and Assessment
- Watch: Children’s Agency and the Curriculum Conference
- What next for curriculum?
- Learner agency and the curriculum: a critical realist perspective
Curriculum and assessment review
A research team based at the UCL Institute of Education is inviting you to take part in a research project designed to understand the thoughts of educational professionals who work in primary schools in England about the recent Curriculum and Assessment Review (CAR).
The review can be found on the Government's website.
Please ensure that you have read this before completing the survey. We are inviting primary school staff to take part in a survey. We very much hope that you would like to take part.
This information sheet will try and answer any questions you might have about the project. Please don’t hesitate to contact us if there is anything else you would like to know.
Who is carrying out the research?
The Principal Investigator leading this project is Professor Alice Bradbury and the Research Assistant is Emily Ranken. They work at the Helen Hamlyn Centre for Pedagogy (HHCP) in the Institute of Education, which is part of University College London. The research study has been approved by the UCL Research Ethics Committee.
Why are we doing this research?
In September 2024, the Government commissioned an independent Curriculum and Assessment Review to examine the National Curriculum and ensure that it remains fit for purpose and meets the needs of children and young people. The review panel ran a call for evidence from stakeholders including education professionals, pupils, parents, and researchers that was open until November 2024. The interim report was published in March 2025, and the final report in November 2025. A new National Curriculum following the recommendations in this report is due to be published in the summer of 2026.
We believe that it is important to understand the reactions of primary school teachers, teaching assistants and school leaders to this report. We would like to know your opinions on whether you think the proposed new curriculum content is relevant, enjoyable and challenging for the children that you teach. We would also like to know the extent to which you feel your views have been taken into account in the process of the CAR.
We plan to conduct a second survey in the autumn of 2026 (depending on the publication date of the new curriculum) to understand your thoughts once the recommendations from the CAR have been implemented into a new curriculum. You do not have to participate in both surveys.
What will happen if I choose to take part?
If you agree to participate you will complete an online questionnaire that we estimate will take between ten and twenty minutes of your time. This will vary depending on whether you complete the open questions, and the amount of detail you provide. We will ask you a number of questions based on the topics we’ve outlined above, in order to find out your views on the CAR. Some will be closed questions and some will be open.
Will anyone know I have been involved?
It is very important for us that you know that no one will be able to find out you have been involved in the project unless you choose to tell people. This means that all your contributions will be anonymised before we use them. In the open questions, you may describe or name particular schools or people, which we will change before we use it. The last question will ask if you would like to be contacted about the second survey in Autumn 2026. If you do give us this information we will separate it from your questionnaire answers to keep your responses confidential.
Could there be problems for me if I take part?
We don’t think that this is a particularly sensitive issue, but you can always opt not to answer any questions. Please be assured that you do not have to answer every question and if, at any point, you feel uncomfortable at any point then you are entitled to stop.
What will happen to the results of the research?
The findings will be put together into a report and may be used in other project publications and publicity. Following this, the findings may be written up in academic publications. All reporting will be fully anonymised, and no individuals or schools will be identifiable. The data collected will be stored on a secure password-protected network, for up to ten years, in line with UCL’s data retention policy. Only the research team will have access to the data.
Do I have to take part?
It is entirely up to you whether or not you choose to take part. We hope that if you do choose to be involved you will find it an interesting experience. Ultimately, we hope our research will contribute to further understandings of the process of curriculum reform.
All participants will be asked to generate a unique ID code in the initial stages of the questionnaire. This is used in case you later change your mind about taking part and wish to remove your answers from the data set. If this is the case, you can contact the researchers stating this ID code and your wish to remove your responses, and this will be actioned immediately.
If you have any questions about the research, you can contact us at:
Professor Alice Bradbury – a.bradbury@ucl.ac.uk
Emily Ranken – e.ranken@ucl.ac.uk
Data Protection Privacy Notice
Notice: The controller for this project will be University College London (UCL). The UCL Data Protection Officer provides oversight of UCL activities involving the processing of personal data, and can be contacted at data-protection@ucl.ac.uk.
This ‘local’ privacy notice sets out the information that applies to this particular study. Further information on how UCL uses participant information from research studies can be found in our general privacy notice for participants in research studies.
The information that is required to be provided to participants under data protection legislation (GDPR and DPA 2018) is provided across both the ‘local’ and ‘general’ privacy notices. The lawful basis that will be used to process any personal data is: ‘Public task’ for personal data and ’Research purposes’ for special category data. We will be collecting personal data such as names and email addresses.
Your personal data will be processed so long as it is required for the research project. If we are able to anonymise or pseudonymise the personal data you provide we will undertake this, and will endeavour to minimise the processing of personal data wherever possible. The data protection reference number for this research is Z6364106/2025/11/17.
If you are concerned about how your personal data is being processed, or if you would like to contact us about your rights, please contact UCL in the first instance at dataprotection@ucl.ac.uk.
Social justice
Our research focuses on how pedagogy can be improved for all children but particularly those living in disadvantaged circumstances. HHCP research seeks to address inequalities and injustices that may prevent children’s progress in education, including those related to the disparities in experience arising from the Covid-19 pandemic.
Our research on social justice:
- Food banks in early years settings
- Food banks in schools: exploring the impact on children’s learning
- Schools never shut: the extraordinary lengths teachers have been going to in supporting children during lockdown
- Evidence Submission to the House of Commons Education Committee on the impact of COVID-19 on education and children’s services
- Choosing welfare over worksheets and care over ‘catch-up’: teachers’ priorities during lockdown
- Supporting primary learning during the COVID-19 outbreak – IOE coffee break
- Why nursery schools are a secret weapon in the fight against inequality
- Why nursery schools are essential
- Westminster and Schools are Increasingly Worlds Apart
- Evidence Submission to the House of Lords Life Beyond Covid Inquiry
- Primary school testing will do more harm than good
- The use of the Phonics Screening Check in Year 2: The views of Year 2 teachers and headteachers (pdf) – covered by Nursery World and the Telegraph
- The role of teaching/classroom assistants during the COVID crisis
- ‘School choice’ policies are associated with increased separation of students by social class
- A frontline service? Nursery Schools as local community hubs in an era of austerity
Contact us
Department of Learning and Leadership
UCL Institute of Education
University College London
20 Bedford Way
London WC1H 0AL
