Childhood Geographies and Spatial Justice: Making Sense of Place and Space-Making as Political Acts in Education

This post-qualitative research analyzes the spatialized practices of young people within a working-class community and how those guided the opening and facilitating of a local community center. Seeing place-making as a social and political act, the authors were inspired by Heath's classic study and argument that children's education might be better served if educators understood and built on their community-based language practices. Writing through theories of new materialism, spatiality, and children's geographies, we build an argument for spatial justice by considering the ways educational scholars and educators might understand and build on children's community-based spatial practices.