Peace announced as Oxford Children’s Word of the Year
Local primary school students reflect on what the word means to them
Last updated 21st Jan 2026
Peace has been chosen as Oxford Children’s Word of the Year for 2025, following research by Oxford University Press.
The research surveyed almost 5,000 children aged 6–14 and found that 35 per cent selected ‘peace’ as their word of the year, closely followed by ‘AI’ at 33 per cent and ‘resilience’ at 21 per cent.
We visited St Christopher’s Primary School in Oxford to find out what peace means to the children.
Some pupils described peace as a feeling people experience when they are happy.
Anna from Year 4 said: “I think peace means when you’re happy that something is calm and safe.”
Polly Rose from Year 4 said: “It’s a place where you can be yourself, relax and be happy.”
Many children also defined peace as having friends and not fighting, while some referenced the importance of peace on a larger scale.
When asked what happens when there isn’t peace, Petros in Year 3 said: “There will be lots of wars and stuff with other countries.”
Andrea Quincey, Director of Early Years and Primary Publishing at Oxford University Press, said:
“A key theme we see from our Oxford Children’s Word of the Year research is just how attuned children are to current affairs. This year is no different; whether that’s calling for peace in response to current conflicts or highlighting how AI has permeated daily life.”
She also said that choosing ‘peace’ represents children “recommending solutions and feeling hopeful and positive for the future.”
A Year 3 student at St Christopher’s shared her aspirations for spreading peace:
Raya said: “I think it stops my friends from fighting but if I keep on doing it, it might go around so eventually the whole world stops fighting.”
One of the teachers at St Christopher’s, Miss Jeffrey, spoke about why ‘peace’ resonates strongly with young children.
She said: “It’s very representative of lots of school values, and I think children are learning a lot at the moment to get along with each other and how to solve conflict on their own.”
For slang words of the year, ‘six-seven’ claimed the top spot, chosen by 47 per cent of children, followed by ‘aura’ at 24 per cent and ‘delulu’ at 7 per cent.
While more than one in ten (12 per cent) of children admitted ‘six-seven’ had no meaning, pupils at St Christopher’s said it originated from a basketball video that went viral on social media.
Regardless of its origins, 72 per cent of children said that using slang words exclusively with their peers is very important to them.
Andrea Quincey added: “Perhaps it’s no surprise that ‘six-seven’ is voted overwhelmingly as their slang word of the year. A word which brings them laughter and joy and connection with friends. We see how important it is for children to have agency over their language away from the grown-up world and share words that adults can’t understand.”