This paper explores the generationing of education and development in five villages in Northern Sierra Leone. Understood as ‘fields’ governed by power dynamics, we consider how the interactive ‘fields’ of generation, education and development coalesce, re/structuring adult and child ‘being’ and ‘doing’. We explore the tensions that arise between transformation and preservation in the field in light of wider social, cultural and economic change, and the negotiation of the generational contract in contexts of high risk and inter-dependency.

In spite of widespread initiatives to improve access to education for girls, substantive concerns remain. While there is a rich and growing body of literature on gendered experiences of school in majority world contexts, absent is a focus on how this intersects with children's out of school lives. Further, research with children in rural communities is limited, including those who are in the earlier years of their schooling. This paper addresses these gaps, focusing on gendered dynamics in the everyday lives of children in five rural communities in Northern Sierra Leone. Drawing on Bourdieu, it explores the dialectical interplay between gendered and generational structures, understood as the gendered habitus, in a wider context of structural poverty, uneven and fragile post-colonial restructuring and development. This sets the groundwork for children's gendered dis/positioning, and ultimately capacity to engage with schooling.

Purpose This paper aims to discuss the construction of two composite indices to assess children’s experiences with violence and peace in primary schools in Sierra Leone. Design/methodology/approach The authors provide a conceptual framework based on the three dimensions of the violence index (direct, structural and cultural violence) and the three dimensions of the positive peace index (inclusion, citizenship and well-being). After that, this work proposes an operationalisation of these concepts based on a survey administered with 2,000 pupils and examine the correlates of the indices. Findings Results indicate not only a substantial level of violence among the sampled schools but also a considerable level of positive peace. These indices are negatively correlated, suggesting that lower levels of violence are related to higher levels of positive peace. Further analysis also shows that socioeconomic variables and school characteristics such as headteacher experience and teacher qualification are associated with levels of violence and peace. Finally, based on longitudinal evidence, this study also indicates that the prevalence of violence is a significant predictor of reading development among children. Originality/value The indicator presented is the first to combine children’s experiences with violence and experiences with positive peace in schools. It is a unique contribution to the measurement of school outcomes that are usually overlooked in the literature.

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In recent decades, photovoice has become a popular method in research that involves children as active research participants. This paper focuses on the procedures and methods of gathering and interpretation of data from a photovoice project with children in rural Sierra Leone. Photovoice in this project was an integral part of a more wide ranging multi-modal study on gender, well-being and schooling of primary school children. The inclusion of photovoice as an additional method of data collection added another lens through which we could understand children’s everyday experiences and encourage their active involvement in the research process. The paper discusses the steps of analysis, showing the benefits of the combination of visual and textual methods and presents reflections on the work with relatively young primary school children with no prior experience with photography.