Children and young people in socially and educationally excluded living conditions – leisure and youth clubs’ work with inclusion processes aimed at the school

This article focuses on the opportunities and impacts of leisure and youth clubs in supporting children and young people who grow up in socially deprived housing areas. These clubs help maintain their schooling and prevent social and learning exclusion processes that seem to occur in school and society. The theoretical and empirical analyses presented are based on a research project that followed children, young people and pedagogical staff in leisure and youth clubs located in three different socially deprived housing areas in Denmark. Inspired by critical psychology and social theory of practice (Holzkamp, K. [2013. “Psychology: Social Self–understanding on the Reasons for Action in the Conduct of Everyday Life.” In Psychology from the Standpoint of the Subject. Selected Writings of Klaus Holzkamp, edited by E. Schraube, and U. Osterkamp, 233–341. New York: Palgrave Macmillian.]; Dreier, O. [2008. Psychotherapy in everyday life. Learning in doing: Social, cognitive, & computational perspectives. New York: Cambridge University Press.], Dreier, O. [2009. “The Development of a Personal Conduct of Life in Childhood.” In Varieties of Theoretical Psychology: International Philosophies and Practical Concerns, edited by T. Teo, P. Stenner, A. Rutherford, E. Park, and C. Baerveldt, 175–183. Toronto: Captus Press Inc.], Dreier, O. [2011. “Personality and the Conduct of Everyday Life.” Nordic Psychology 63 (2): 4–23.]; Wenger, E. [1998. Communities of Practice. Learning, Meaning and Identity. Cambridge: University Press.]), the analyses of the empirical material identify how young people, especially young men of ethnic minority backgrounds, struggle to maintain their schooling.