Using a mosaic-based approach to construct children's understanding of safe space in school

This conceptually confused term, originating in 1960’s civil rights movements and popularised through psychotherapy, has recently been described as the second-most popular strategy for supporting children’s anxiety in UK schools. The scarce research literature documents adult views of the benefits of safe space, with little reference to children’s perceptions.

Using a Mosaic-based approach, offering child-centred, multi-modal methods enabled seven children and their three teachers to construct their understanding of safe space in school. Children designated as users of safe space due to having autism and/or socioemotional difficulties, led the researcher on a school tour and took photos of a puppet in their chosen safe spaces, teachers were subsequently interviewed. Visual data was categorised using content analysis and combined with inductive, reflexive thematic analysis of verbal data to identify themes.