Children's agency and participation in a water awareness program
in early childhood centres in Australia This paper reports on an
evaluation of this program, which was a qualitative study that
explored the children’s learning and action that stemmed from
children, parents and teachers engagement in the program. Data
consisted of water audits and reports developed for each of the
17 participating centres, as well as from conversations with
children, and interviews and surveys conducted with staff and
parents at three of the centres. The results showed that, as
well learning new knowledge about water conversation, the
children, staff, and parents also changed their attitudes to
water conservation and, importantly, adopted water conservation
actions and strategies. Some centres undertook large-scale
redevelopments of centre grounds, while others made substantive
efforts to purchase and install water-saving devices. The study
found that children influenced the adults around them in
relation to improving their wat