By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE I have written about perspective before. Perspective is a fascinating word for it can be defined in multiple ways. Perspective is: A particular way of seeing something. To think about a situation or problem in a wise and reasonable way. To compare something to other things so it can be … Continue reading
Filed under Reggio Inspiration …
The Environment as the Third Teacher: The Land as the First Teacher
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE and Cindy Green, RECE. In the Reggio Emilia preschools, the space encourages encounters, communication, and relationships. Such care is taken in the preparation of the environment that it acts as a third teacher. For decades we have worked with early learning students who were required to do placements. When we … Continue reading
Loose Parts: Children as Creators rather than Consumers
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE. Have you ever heard something that you felt was so profound that years and years later, you remember what it was and where you were? It was twelve years ago, when I first met Margie Carter and Deb Curtis and heard them speak at a conference I helped organize in … Continue reading
Themes in Early Childhood Education: Will They Ever End?
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE. It was about fifteen years ago that I embarked on a journey to research, write and defend a doctoral dissertation on emergent curriculum. I wanted to write about a topic that reflected my practice as an early childhood educator and focused on an unresolved problem. I graduated with an early … Continue reading
Pedagogy in Early Childhood Education: The Art of Teaching and Learning
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE and Cindy Green, RECE. I (Diane) don’t remember when I first heard the word pedagogy but if memory serves me well, I started to really think about the term when I began to study the Reggio Emilia Approach to early learning in the late nineties. I kept coming across the term … Continue reading
Relationships at the Heart of Pedagogy
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE. Pedagogy is defined as the method and practice of teaching. For early childhood educators it is about the understanding of how learning takes place and pedagogical approaches employed to support learning. It is different than curriculum which is the content of the learning (Ontario Ministry of Education, 2014). An emergent … Continue reading
On Being Mindful, Grateful and Joyful: It Matters!
By: Cindy Green, RECE (with contributions from Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE). As an antidote to the last blog post where there was focus on ranting while reflecting on words that cause agitation Cindy offers some thoughts on being mindful, grateful and joyful. Then as promised there will be a return to the ranting as this … Continue reading
Beyond Description: Making Professional Knowledge Visible through Pedagogical Documentation
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE (with contributions from Cindy Green, RECE). This blog post has been ruminating with me for some time now. The process of pedagogical documentation is a new concept to many early childhood educators. According to Dahlberg and Moss (2008) “pedagogical documentation has its origins in the innovative and, today, world-famous municipal early childhood services in … Continue reading
Learning in and with Nature: The Pedagogy of Place
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE. The joy of discovery can span over time. As a child, I loved finding hidden treasures in my explorations in nature. As an adult, I have retained this compulsion to search for nature’s bounty and my favourite place to do it, is on the beach. It might be a rock that’s shaped … Continue reading
Messing About with Messy Play: Messy Maths and More
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE. Years ago, I was profoundly influenced by the legacy of Frances and David Hawkins. David Hawkins along with his wife Frances, an early childhood educator, were “committed to the idea that in order to best serve children, teachers need to be dedicated learners as well” (Lynch, Shaffer, & Hall, 2009, … Continue reading