Research Paper on:
UK Government and Childhood

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
a gradual maturation process takes place leading the child into adulthood. Childhood may be seen as one of the last places that government interventions should be intervening when defining and  setting limits on childhood. However, if we look at the last ten years the British Government has undertaken different actions that have done exactly that. The Childrens Act 1989 is  not within the last ten years, however, this can be seen as significant as this single Act changed the culture and definitions of how children we seen, and sets the  scene for later moves (Cretney and Masson, 1997). This is also worth noting as the equivalent act only came into force on Scotland in 1998 (Lexis, 2002). The initial  aspect of childrens right drew more attention to the role that children have in society, and also the role that society should play in protecting and nurturing children. With increased  rights, there was also an increased recognition that children were important individuals. When this attitudes starts to pervade the government more attention has to be paid to other aspects pf  childhood and the provision and attitudes that surround it. IF we look to the position ten years ago, there was much criticism regarding how children were seen. There was  a low priority given to nursery education (Blackburne, 1994). The education of the under fives was sparse and dependant on geographical location. The way that the government wants children  to be treated has changed. At this stage education may have been important, but preschool education was seen as a low priority, until the age of five children were not  obliged to attend any formal education. However, in the last ten years a number of government programmes, such as the Desirable outcomes programme in 1996, the Early Learning Goals in