I recently spoke to someone who
I consider to be a Guru of early childhood education. She has been in the field
her entire career and now is ready to retire. She is my mentor! As I think
about critical thinking in early childhood, I think about how would I do this
at such an early age. In my reading I came across promoting critical thinking
skills through play, art and movement. I wanted to talk to her about her
thoughts on this concept. She thought this was a great idea to promote language
and thinking. She told me she often walks into prekindergarten programs where
the students are sitting at the table completing worksheets. Then she told me
about a few amazing prekindergarten programs that focus on Reggio Emilia
approach. I have heard of this approach but I didn’t have a full understanding
of the concept. I started to research this approach and found it to be very
insightful. The information I read about was very valuable but I found one
value to be critical in the
learning process-making learning visible. I love the idea that learning is documented
with cameras, tape recorders, journals, quotes from the children about their
work and portfolios-not worksheets and tests.
I found this site to be
helpful in understanding the approach.
http://www.education.com/magazine/article/Reggio_Emilia/
