From awareness to selective enactment: teachers’ practices of children’s rights and their implications

This study examines teachers’ awareness of children’s rights in Türkiye and how they report translating this awareness into classroom practice. Using an explanatory sequential mixed-methods design, quantitative data were collected from 1,918 public-school teachers, followed by semi-structured interviews with 17 teachers. Teachers reported high awareness of children’s rights, but their accounts indicated uneven enactment across practice dimensions. Protection-oriented practices, including safety, digital-risk prevention, and harm prevention, were reported more readily, whereas participation rights and responses to rights violations were less frequent and more context-dependent. This pattern of selective enactment was shaped by classroom conditions, curriculum demands, examination pressures, and family influences. Moving beyond a simple awareness–practice gap, the study conceptualizes selective enactment as a process through which teachers interpret, filter, and operationalize different dimensions of children’s rights within contextual constraints. Findings underscore the need for practice-oriented, context-sensitive professional development and stronger participatory pedagogies to support balanced rights-based education.