1. Philosophy
1.1. Socrates - don't answer questions, 'you're not able to be the educator of your sons... Find a good teacher for ourselves.'
2. Strategy
2.1. Problem for strategies in the development of cities etc - normally, education is not included. Where is the place of education in strategic planning? In Reggio Emilia, it's at the top. Not because you have money, not through generosity, but to ensure growth etc.
2.2. Return on human capital is highest when the investment comes in the early years.
3. Research
3.1. Invitation to work with Reggio to get involved: drawing power for the research and economic impact through education - an economy based ok k owledge( which I take to mean self-knowledge rather than facts - foundation Reggio Children
4. Environment
4.1. The piazza is a very important metaphor for the learning environments and the way the mind works/learns
4.1.1. Visit to infant/toddler centre (video)
4.1.1.1. A window into everything... Even the kitchen. The whole environment is a learning space and what's important are the interactions, not the learning. Children see beyond the activities of their own learning into the learning of others. Spaces are not passive but active within the learning.
4.1.1.2. Free-flow around spaces
4.1.1.3. Lots of provocations for learning
4.1.1.4. Video allows analysis of whether theories come into practice. It's not a record of learning but a prompt to reflection (by teachers) as much as anything else.
4.1.1.5. Work in the schools is organised by the people working in them, not by external agencies. High levels of professional responsibility are contracted including meetings and training for every single member of the school community. Requires 'co-responsibility'
4.1.1.6. Educators are researchers in learning, not deliverers of learning.
4.1.1.7. Groups of professional, parents and learners provide the diversity and range over a period of 3 years.
4.1.1.8. The school is a system of relationships between the members of the school with three protagonists, the teachers, the children and the families
4.1.1.9. No hierarchy in the times of the day... Every part of the days an important time of learning. Even eating... Choosing, preparing and sharing food to develop understanding and habits
5. Resources
5.1. One city, many children, book
5.2. Research booklet 2010
6. Ideas or questions to take back to school
6.1. Shifting expectations. When the 'product' of learning is learning (knowledge, skills, understanding) and not a 'piece of work'. How do you help every member of the community to understand the value of that learning (when there is nothing to 'show' for it?)
6.2. Informing parents: to show how more discursive/creative activities promote really effective learning even when there is no 'product'... Video of the week. 5min video condensing 50mins learning into important factors for presentation to parents
6.3. How do you tackle the 'oppression of measurement' in uk schools (quote from UK teacher)
6.4. Stay curious (teachers and children)
6.5. Links between learning spaces. If links are related to pairs of year groups in our context, EYFS, ks1, lower KS2 and upper KS2 can we link EYFS spaces across the external spaces instead of within the building (since they aren't adjacent).
6.6. We have to leave space in the day to take care of the things that are important... And that's not the product of the work, but the outcome of learning and the community.
6.7. Who but a child would have noticed that the pillars in the new Loris Malaguzzi Centre are naked and thought that they should make them something to wear? A really lovely project and an abject lesson in what children can teach adults... stay curious!!!
6.8. Windows through to learning possibilities
6.9. The trick is to think about how you provoke investigations and exploration, of materials or ideas.. I suppose it'saboutopenin the door to possibilities, not guiding exploration...
6.10. All the teachers presenting talk so eloquently and confidently and in such deep thought -why? I think it's because they spend so much time talking to one another about it. They present as if each bit of work was a real bit of research...which of course, it is!
6.11. Drawing project in the forest is an abject lesson in how to look and record, we should use this iour next grounds project
6.12. The success of all this depends on our ability to let go of the idea that the product of learning is anything specific. We have to embrace the idea that the product of learning is learning. There will be evidence, notes, drawings, photos, collections of objects, but that evidence will not be the learning, just the product of learning
6.13. These experiments have changed the way children respond to materials, now they go beyond the expected on a daily basis.
6.14. Parental meetings... We need to get these'what we are doing' meetings in the diary and communicated to parents as soon as possible (into the whole school diary)
6.15. First theme in any school year, welcome to our world. Last theme in any school year, hello and goodbye. Preparations for starting and evolving year group communities. This could involve parents and children, though possibly separately. Each class then takes some artefact/record of the work done each Septemebr with them through the school to make a record of their progress through school... Like a year book.
6.16. Could something similar be done with and for parents? Could this be a development of the class reps group?
7. Community
7.1. Thomas Jefferson - "life, liberty and the persist of happiness"
7.2. The school is th expression of the society... The school is able to change the society
7.3. Bonding vs Bridging: A group that is full of the same sports of people is closed, a group that is different is open. Reggio schools have diverse memberships and this is cause for celebration. Here, being the same is not a benefit!
7.4. Respect, listen, give time - these are the three characteristics that the school needs to have an impact on children
7.5. Care generates care, attention generates attention. Trust generates trust
7.6. What's a community
7.6.1. History goes back 50 years... An experiment in pedagogy that has involved the whole comminity
7.6.2. First school built after 2nd WW with intention of providing new ... Questioning the whole community about its intentions and what it wanted in the aftermath of war.
7.6.3. Willingness to cross boundaries is part of the success of the project-inter-disciplinary and transformational (Carla Rinaldi)
7.6.4. Different forms of knowledge (subjects) leak into one another, it isn't possible to have subjects taught effectively in isolation. So different disciplines have to work together - how else can you explore every facet of an idea?
7.6.5. Dialogue between protagonists is essential to bring about transformation. Listening and building relations between those involved.
7.6.6. The focus on transformation is what allows the system to evolve and embrace new opportunities.
7.6.7. Reggio has 170000 inhabitants.
7.6.8. Children are citizens from the very beginning
7.6.8.1. Children are protagonists within the community from the outset... It's a key part of the approach and underpins much thinking and planning.
7.6.8.2. What if it's not just mothers who expects a baby, but the whole community that expects it?
7.6.8.3. We need to celebrate a child's perspective, because it's different, not bound by expectation gives a fresh perspective and always asks new question. Sometimes these new questions are prompted by actions of practitioners, but not controlled or led by them
7.6.8.4. It's about ideas, and not pieces of practice. A shared philosophy rather than curriculum. And this evolves all the time and we are committed to it.
7.6.8.5. Children approach new experiences with their own characteristics.
7.6.8.6. Children are constantly engaged in seeking to create relationships between themselves and their environment. This is how you 'teach' curiosity - by provoking and celebrating individual ideas.
7.6.8.7. What is the role of the school in modern society?
8. Infant Toddler Centre
8.1. Design critical to create spaces that allow children to work according to the philosophy... Open to possibilities
8.2. Envisaged many different spaces in one school
8.3. This design philosophy has developed over the years so different settings have different features
8.4. All with the meta-cognitive philosophy, though. Is this actually a meta-cognitive approach, though?
8.5. Concepts to review in other settings:
8.5.1. Access to unusual recourses
8.5.2. Shelters/flexible spaces (relaxing or discovering)
8.5.3. Many resources created in collaboration between families and teachers
8.5.4. The idea of the piazza - where people meet, conversations start and ideas are born... The 'piazza' is literally and metaphorically central to the concept of the way the schools work.
8.5.5. Idea of the windows and connections between different learning spaces. An exchange of ideas within the piazza
8.5.6. Materials not normally available to young children, hard, fragile, cool, materials etc.
8.5.7. Offer many different perspectives... Looking down and up and everyday things to get a new view/perspective
8.5.8. Atelier spaces - shared spaces dedicated to expressive activities/languages. These ideas are in every space but a specific focus in the atelier
8.5.9. Piazze can be used for all sorts of shared things, plants are often evident, sometimes cropping and sometimes decorative.
8.5.10. Dining area... An Atelier of tastes
9. Cervi - Nido Communale - Cervi is connected to evens of the ww2. Symbol of peace.
9.1. Opened 40 years ago.
9.2. Site for some 'women's movements'
9.3. 70 children 3 to 36 months open full time. Uk flexible.
9.4. Here, an assembly is a time when interesting guest ions and investigations might start, it doesn't have a defined timescale and can involve all groups or may break into smaller groups. Before lunch they might meet again and talk about what has happened so far.
9.5. You note how few resources there are, but how beautifully they're presented. A little goes a long way. It provokes questions rather than supports learning(or so it seems to me?
10. Wonder of learning and the idea of care in schools
10.1. Ideas of attention, research and listening to children in our schools.
10.2. An approach to stimulating 'awe and wonder' - 'stupore' Currently an exhibition that's touring the world)
10.3. Wonder is a natural state for humans. It is a form of intelligence or perhaps a consequence of intelligence.
10.3.1. Here, 'wonder' may be closely aligned to curiosity - it is an active condition and promotes activity, research, questioning and the desire to learn.
10.3.2. The Reggio approach requires this condition to be as active in the teachers as in the children.
10.3.2.1. Idea here... Young teachers working together to design learning opportunities for children in the centres: they said that 'wonder' is a kind of bell that rings in your mind and that pushes you to reach towards new possibilities. What might have or could have happened instead of what is happening. Reflective practice.
10.3.2.2. Part of the practice that is developed here is that teachers are constantly looking at what is happening now and considering how these approaches could open new opportunities for learning. So this is 'progetazione' and is the active part of professional practice. This is the research that Reggio considers... Attention towards research rather than a research project as such.
10.3.2.3. There is then a tension. The research carried out by adults is of no use in isolation. It needs the thoughts of the children and their families. It informs a continuous and ongoing dialogue about the child and their learning.
10.3.3. Watching video of infants settling into a new group 9 to 18 months. Note how little the teachers talk to the children, not prompting their interactions but allowing them to flow.
10.3.3.1. Talking to families about the separation issues they experience is very valuable.
10.3.3.2. "if it's possible, nothing without joy"! Loris Malaguzzi
10.3.3.3. The videos are taken by teachers to inform professional discussions and development but the 'teachers eye' is very important in terms of deciding which bits of video are important and relevant.
10.3.3.4. Note... We're always too busy! Remember the cook in the kitchen engaging with the toddler when she could easily have waved and carried on! You have to make the time...
10.3.4. Conversely, it's interesting to see how much the teachers then talk to one another about what the children did and how the activities might evolve. This is the epitome of reflective practice in action!