Parental knowledge and experience of nurture groups

: A mixed methods study

Abstract

Nurture groups, originally developed by Marjorie Boxall in 1969, are defined as an in-school resource for primary school children whose emotional, social, behavioural and educational needs cannot be met in a mainstream classroom. Boxall felt that the difficulties faced by these children stemmed from early years spent in homes which could not give them the nurturing they needed. The main premise of a nurture group is to interact with the pupil in a way that is appropriate for their developmental age, rather than their chronological age. Previous research has suggested that nurture groups are an effective intervention and pre- and post-measures with pupils and information gathered from school staff have been encouraging. Less research has been carried out with families of children who attend nurture groups. This research seeks to explore parental knowledge and experience of nurture groups in Northern Ireland. The researcher utilised a pragmatic philosophical stance. This study employed a convergent, parallel mixed methods design. Participants were parents and carers whose child was attending or had attended a nurture group in Northern Ireland. A link to a questionnaire was sent by the school, 21 participants completed the questionnaire. Interviews were conducted with 7 parents/carers whose child previously attended a nurture group in one school. Descriptive statistics were carried out on the quantitative phase of the study and Thematic Analysis was used to analyse the qualitative data. The findings were combined and discussed in relation to previous research in the field. The findings were overwhelmingly positive.

Date of Award	Dec 2022
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Queen's University Belfast
Supervisor	Patricia Davison (Supervisor)