Big Ask survey of children and young people in England

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Has your dc been asked to complete the Big Ask survey?

www.childrenscommissioner.gov.uk/thebigask You can take a look at the surveys for the different age groups here.

The one issue I have with it that some of the answers are quite narrow. Will anything useful come from this?

I hadn't heard of it but just had a look. I don't really see the point of this.

We signed up to something at the beginning of COVID that asked similar questions, I think it was for DfE, we did three or four surveys I think. Don't see why they need to do this.

Anyone can answer it, kids are likely to get details wrong, I just put in my kid's school name and there were hundreds to chose from. I could have submitted my answers.

The data will be invalid.

I'm not sure if it's a good idea to survey children as young as 6 and ask them big question with a narrow set of answers. One of the questions is

School have informed parents that all children are doing this next week in class. The issue of consent wasn't mentioned.

One question asks:
My family’s health
Happy Neutral unhappy.
How should a 6 year old possibly answer this question? Also, what if by being asked all these questions they realise they're unhappy, there won't be anyone supporting them and young chairmen may feel vulnerable.

Or
My life overall
Happy Neutral unhappy.

No-one is happy or neutral or unhappy all the time, weird questions.

Another one about their future:
When you grow up, which things do you think will be most important for you to have a good life?

Being asked this is for many children the first time, it's just so odd to enter this into a survey and no meaningful conversations around this.

I don't find it very age appropriate TBH.

*young chairmen
children!!

In the 9-12 survey:

When you grow up, how likely do you think it is that you will have a better life than your parents?*

What a weird question
What does better mean? And what a strange concept to pant into their minds?

No comment on the survey, but I am loving your autocorrect this morning OP! I certainly don't want anyone panting anything into my young Chairman's mind!

For my year 6 the temptation not to pronounce the k clearly was to great as he felt that his name for it was more appropriate, The Big Arse.

The question about if your life will be better than your parents is subject to so much bias. It firstly depends on how you rate lifestyle. Is it in terms of financial success, happiness, fame etc. It also depends on how successful your parents are. Even someone who to the outside world is very privileged might still feel they can't live up to expectations. How can Prince Edward be more successful than the Queen, even though his lifestyle is very good, even by mumsnet standards ? I guess it might also be a measure of optimism. If you are feeling pessimistic then you are likely to think your future is not positive. Too open to interpretation.