Newborns are tuned in to the ups and downs of speech, and even a cry mimics language heard while in the womb

The upward intonation, the guttural “ck” and even the cheeky comeback to win the argument: at just 19 months old, baby Orla has mastered the crucial elements of speaking like a scouser.

Impressively, the toddler who featured in a viral video this week appears to have done so without the need for actual words.

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More than 170,000 people are on waiting lists to join the Scouts and Girlguiding

Youth groups are clamouring for more volunteers amid a rise in the number of parents seeking affordable and sociable outdoor activities for their children away from screens.

Groups including Girlguiding and the Woodcraft Folk are facing substantial unmet demand for their sessions as the Scouts this week said their waiting list has hit a historic high.

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Marrying young girls may now be illegal, but lawmakers seem reluctant to put a stop to genital cutting, and the two go hand in hand

This week, Sierra Leone made history when the president signed into law the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act 2024 . For a country with one of the highest rates of child marriage, teenage pregnancy and maternal mortality in the world, it is a crucial step forward, and a hard-won achievement for campaigners in west Africa.

Sierra Leone has 800,000 child brides – and of those more than half were married before the age of 15, so there is no question that this is groundbreaking legislation. It repeals previous ambiguous laws to explicitly name child marriage as illegal and underscores a clear commitment to girls’ rights. The legislation also establishes mechanisms for enforcement, ensuring that perpetrators – including the husband and those who enable the marriage such as parents and the person officiating – are held accountable by up to 15 years’ imprisonment, with survivors now able to seek justice and compensation.

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Shorter playtimes and shrinking outside space in England have serious implications for children’s wellbeing and mental health

• Revealed: students at top private schools have 10 times more green space than state pupils
• Indoors at breaktime: the school in a London office block
• Private schools in England should be made to share their green space, say campaigners

Children are facing a “brutal” loss of space and time for play in school, teachers, unions and academics have warned.

A combination of factors is eating into the time children spend outside, and will have serious implications for their wellbeing and mental health.

A Guardian analysis of the space available to state school children in England has revealed that thousands are attending schools with very little outside space, with government data showing that more than 300 schools have under 1,000 sq metres and at least 20 have no outside space. In nearly 1,000 schools, there is under 10 sq metres for each pupil.

New and unpublished research from the UCL Institute of Education seen by the Guardian showed a continued downward trend in the amount of time children have for playtime in the wake of the Covid lockdowns, with the youngest losing the most time.

The demands of the curriculum have increased, and continue to diminish time outside, while staffing shortages are reducing capacity to oversee playtime.

Across England and Wales schools face difficult financial decisions, which are having an impact on the funding to care for grounds. Headteachers in the state sector have said they are in desperate need of funding to improve basic facilities for children.

School buildings are crumbling, as many were built with Raac (reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete) that was not replaced within its usable lifetime, meaning in some cases playgrounds are being used to host temporary classrooms. This is squeezing out the little space some schools have for children to spend time outside.

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Courtauld Gallery, London
‘Take our picture, mister!’ they shouted at Mayne, who not only captured children on the streets of postwar London, but helped turn photography into an art form

In its 92-year history, the Courtauld Gallery in London has never acquired or exhibited photography – until now. Its inaugural exhibition is Roger Mayne: Youth , devoted to some 60 works by the self-taught British photographer best known for his documents of working-class children on the poor and battered streets of postwar London.

When trying to open up programmes to new audiences, photography is a natural step for any institution that has previously ignored the medium. Mayne seems a safe choice for a gallery known mostly for its collection of impressionist and post-impressionist paintings, one its usual audiences might not balk at. They might compare Mayne’s populated group shots to impressionism’s busy scenes of people at leisure. Even the ideas of the impressionists somewhat inform Mayne’s approach to documentary photography – the notion that there is a difference between what is in front of you and what you see.

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A Guardian report has revealed the huge areas of outdoor space owned by UK private schools. It’s time for this inequality to end

• Revealed: students at top private schools have 10 times more green space than state pupils

It was during the worst months of Covid that the playing fields of Eton and the vast grounds owned by hundreds of other private schools first became a matter of serious public concern. Social-distancing rules meant many children attending state schools were corralled into concrete playgrounds or sent home while their wealthier counterparts were enjoying acres of spatial freedom in gated communities.

It wasn’t long before the cry went out for private schools to open their gates to their state school neighbours. Very few schools answered that call. Today we learn the true extent of the inequality between the green-space premium enjoyed by fee-paying pupils over state-school children. A Guardian investigation has found that children at the top 250 English private schools have more than 10 times as much outdoor space as those who go to state schools.

Robert Verkaik is an author and journalist specialising in extremism and education

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Schools and health services forced to offer crisis help in the form of food, clothing, money and advice

Britain’s schools and primary health services are “staggering” under the pressure of demand caused by an epidemic of extreme poverty, as desperate families unable to afford food, clothing or heating increasingly turn to them for crisis help.

Teachers and GPs in England, Scotland and Wales are informally acting as emergency food providers, welfare advisers, housing officers and social workers alongside their day jobs, as they devote more and more time and resources to support struggling parents and children, new research has found.

Primary school staff estimated 48% of their pupils, and primary care staff 57% of their patients, had experienced hardship at some point since the start of the school year or over the past 12 months.

A third of schools, and nearly half of GP surgeries, had set up food banks to provide emergency food supplies to hungry pupils and families. Staff in schools in deprived areas estimated 44% of pupils had come to school hungry over the past year.

Nearly a quarter of NHS primary care staff and 40% of teachers said they had dipped into their own pockets to help pupils and patients. In one case, a nurse gave new underpants, still in their packet and intended for her husband, to a desperate patient.

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IFS research shows 670,000 more children will be hit by policy by end of next parliament if limit stays in place

Keir Starmer is facing renewed pressure to scrap the two-child benefit limit, as research reveals that 250,000 more children will be hit by the policy over the next year alone.

Labour’s manifesto for government, published last week, included the promise of an “ambitious strategy to reduce child poverty”, but no mention of the two-child limit.

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‘Abject failure’ of family reunion scheme to provide legal route is leaving children at risk of trafficking or even death

Children are being trapped in war zones as a result of “impossible” bureaucratic requirements imposed on one of the few legal routes for asylum seekers, a charity has found.

The government has championed family reunion processes as a means for refugees to safely reunite with loved ones in Britain, but according to a new report by Ramfel, a charity that supports vulnerable migrants, the scheme is “not fit for purpose” and applicants have been abandoned , leaving them at risk of trafficking or even death.

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