Guiding Principles

• We believe that families and the teaching staff are partners in the care and education of their children.
• We believe that all children are able, competent learners and that their social and emotional health and development are directly related to their cognitive growth and development.
• We believe that the learning environment should be rich with possibilities for exploration, inquiry and problem solving in all domains.
• We believe that the children’s programs should be guided by developmentally appropriate and culturally relevant practices, and that research and established best practices should inform our curricula.
• We believe that teaching staff have a special responsibility to observe, interpret and document children’s interests, their questions and their learning, and to incorporate this in their planning.
• We believe that in order to maintain program excellence, we must support opportunities for continuing education for our teaching staff in the field of early childhood education, recreation and school-age programming.

At CEP, our Early Learning Centers and School Age Programs are all Reggio Inspired and utilize the Emergent Curriculum.   This is a wonderful opening statement, but not widely understood by both parents and educators alike.

So, what exactly is Reggio?

The Reggio Emilia Approach is an educational philosophy focused on preschool and primary education. It was started by Loris Malaguzzi and the parents of the villages around Reggio Emilia in Italy after World War II. The destruction from the war, parents believed, necessitated a new, quick approach to teaching their children. They felt that it is in the early years of development that children form who they are as individuals. This led to creation of a program based on the principles of respect, responsibility, and community through exploration and discovery in a supportive and enriching environment based on the interests of the children through a self-guided curriculum.

Philosophy

The city of Reggio Emilia in Italy is recognized worldwide for its innovative approach to education. Its signature educational philosophy has become known as the Reggio Emilia Approach, one which many preschool programs around the world have adopted. The Reggio Emilia philosophy is based upon the following set of principles:

• Children must have some control over the direction of their learning;
• Children must be able to learn through experiences of touching, moving, listening, seeing, and hearing;
• Children have a relationship with other children and with material items in the world that children must be allowed to explore and
• Children must have endless ways and opportunities to express themselves.

The Reggio Emilia approach to teaching young children puts the natural development of children as well as the close relationships that they share with their environment at the center of its philosophy. Early childhood programs that have successfully adapted to this educational philosophy share that they are attracted to Reggio because of the way it views and respects the child.

Parents are a vital component to the Reggio Emilia philosophy. Parents are viewed as partners, collaborators and advocates for their children. Teachers respect parents as each child's first teacher and involve parents in every aspect of the curriculum. It is not uncommon to see parents volunteering within Reggio Emilia classrooms throughout the school. This philosophy does not end when the child leaves the classroom. Most parents who choose to send their children to a Reggio Emilia program incorporate many of the principles within their parenting and home life. Even with this bridge between school and home, many people wonder what happens to Reggio children when they make the transition from this style of education to a non Reggio Emilia school. The answer is that there is some adjustment that must take place. In most school environments, intellectual curiosity is rewarded, so students continue to reap the benefits of Reggio after they've left the program.

Reggio Emilia Video

And what is the Emergent Curriculum?

Emergent curriculum is a way of planning curriculum based on the student’s interest and passions as well as the teacher’s. To plan an emergent curriculum requires observation, documentation, creative brainstorming, flexibility and patience. Rather than starting with a lesson plan which requires a “hook” to get the children interested, emergent curriculum starts with the children’s interests. This is not to say that the teacher has no input, in fact teachers may well have a general topic they think is important for children to study and they may purposely include certain materials or experiences related to it as jumping off points. Elizabeth Jones points out:

We are the stage directors; curriculum is teacher’s responsibility, not children’s. People who hear the words emergent curriculum may wrongly assume that everything simply emerges from the children. The children’s ideas are an important source of curriculum but only one of many possible sources that reflect the complex ecology of their lives. (Jones p. 5)

This process requires a great deal of flexibility and creativity on the part of the teacher. Carolyn Edwards notes: “The teachers honestly do not know where the group will end up. Although this openness adds a dimension of difficulty to their work, it also makes it more exciting.” (Edwards p 159)

Once teachers see an interest “emerging” they brainstorm ways to study the topic in depth. Webbing is often used because of its playful and flexible nature. A web doesn’t show everything that will be learned, it shows many things that could be learned. However it is important to use the webbing as a tool to open the teacher to possibilities not a “plan.” Teachers brainstorm many possibilities for study sparked from the particular interest, not as a plan but more as a ‘road map’ as one teacher put it: To get a plan, we chose an idea and brainstormed ways that children could play it – hands-on activities we could provide. Putting all the activities on a web gives you a road map full of possible journeys. (Jones p. 129)

An idea for a curriculum topic may be sparked by anything or come from anywhere. For instance, a teacher may overhear a group of students having a discussion about bugs that leads to the class sitting down and coming up with a web topic that explores all the possible directions the class could go in their quest to learn all they can about the topic of bugs. Ideas may also be sparked by offering experiences such as taking a walk through the neighborhood, visiting local businesses, or reading books.

Emergent Curriculum Video

Sources

• Jones, Elizabeth., Evans, Kathleen.,& Stritzel, Kay. The Lively Kindergarten: Emergent Curriculum in Action. Washington DC: NAEYC. 2001.
• Edwards, Carolyn. Gandini, Lella, Forman, George. The Hundred Languages of Children: The Reggio Emilia Approach to Early Childhood Education. New Jersey: Ablex Publishing Corp. 1993.