“The Reggio Emilia Approach is an educational philosophy based on the image of the child, and of human beings, as possessing strong potentials for development and as a subject of rights who learns and grows in the relationships with others.
This global educational project, which is carried forth in the Municipal Infant-toddler Centers and Preschools of Reggio Emilia, Italy, and has inspired other schools all over the world, is based on a number of distinctive characteristics: the participation of families, the collegial work of all the personnel, the importance of the educational environment, the presence of the atelier and the figure of the atelierista, the in-school kitchen, and the pedagogical coordinating team. Focusing on the centrality of the hundred languages belonging to every human being, in the atelier spaces young children are offered daily opportunities to encounter many types of materials, many expressive languages, many points of view, working actively with hands, minds, and emotions, in a context that values the expressiveness and creativity of each child in the group.” https://www.reggiochildren.it/identita/reggio-emilia-approach/?lang=en Reggio Emilia is a region in Italy and this name of teaching refers purely to these schools, however many practitioners are now turning to Reggio approaches in their own classrooms. This approach is very much child led and individual to both the wider community and also the smaller community – that being the children in your cohort. For this reason there is no, one typical ‘Reggio Emilia’ style. The fundamentals are that children are supported to become independent, be good communicators and that children have some control over their own learning and be able to create and develop their own learning. This is similar to an approach that any Philosophy for Children classroom will want to adopt as we create critical and creative thinkers in all areas – allowing them to have control over the activities they do and the resources they use with nothing that is in reach being out of bounds. In Reggio Emilia there is a heavy emphasis on the many different ways children might communicate their learning, in particular through artistic methods such as role play, art and music. The environment should be simple, beautiful and free from clutter. Much like in philosophy for children, the adult is seen as less of a teacher and more of a facilitator – like the Socrates comparison of a ‘midwife’ (helping children to birth the ideas and learning that are already inside them) and a ‘gadfly’ (pushing children with challenges and problems to solve). One of the core beliefs of this approach is that children form their own personality and knowledge in their very early years and communicate this through ‘a hundred languages’, by which they mean that they show this in everything they do – from play to art to dance to music to speech. Children should have endless ways in which to express themselves and endless materials available with which to do so. In your philosophy for children classroom you can offer this with indoor and outdoor opportunities to make music, listen to music, make large and small scale art, observational drawings, junk modelling, ephemeral art and deconstructed role play. You could even set up your own atelier (art studio) which makes the most of natural lighting, beautiful resources and conscious use of space. As a practitioner you can embrace both a Reggio style and a philosophy for children approach by spending high quality time with each child as you get to know all of their personal quirks, interests, loves and idiosyncrasies.
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AuthorMiss Magical Mess is a pre-school teacher and P4C Level 2B facilitator. After a shaky start as a P4C facilitator (P4C with 3 year olds... are you kidding?) Miss Magical Mess created her own approach to P4C and enquiry model and is now a big fan. Archives |