visionary education community - Reggio Emilia Inspired
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Kathleen
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- Orlando, FL
- United States
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- What inspires you about the Reggio Emilia Approach?
- The open endedness of the philosophy. The fact that children are creators in their own learning experience and that in order for them to flourish they just need some gentle assurance in the background.
- About Me:
- This is my bio on examiner.com where I'm the orlando early childhood education examiner......
For twenty years Kathleen had the privilege of working with children in Traditional Preschools and Montessori Preschools. She was in lead teaching positions but also served as director for three years in a large childhood development center in the Cincinnati area. She now resides in the Orlando area with her husband and looks forward to sharing concepts, concerns, philosophies and local early childhood happenings.
Send feed-back to KathleenTehrani@yahoo.com
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Thanks for the article. I have a child this year who is being evaluated and may be on the autism spectrum. Early in the year, he was not communicative, and often hissed or scratched at people. When he was upset, he blinked his eyes repeatedly and said nothing. Language continues to be an issue; it is very hard for him to name things like colors, letters, and numbers. The children in the class like this boy, even though he is frequently a bit rough with them. Most treat him as they would a two-or three-year-old friend. They accept that he is still learning to do the right thing in school, and try to help him out. This child has found several things he enjoys doing, one of which is taking photographs, particularly during the shooting of our stop-motion animation project. He mostly liked to see his hands in the viewfinder, and explore the idea of being on TV. He has taken responsibility for communicating, likes to share with the whole class, and everyone noticed when he cried normally yesterday when he was unhappy. We all found it easier to comfort him.
So, I'm not much of an expert. In early childhood education, so much of what we do is tailored to the particular development of each child. The standardization pressure is not as great. I did ask my child the same questions as I asked everyone else, but I felt encouraged that I got the answer "That's for treasure. We'll dig up the treasure," instead of "That's X."
In Reggio Emilia, children with special rights are given preference as far as admission. The schools try to spread these children around so that there would not be a large cluster in any one school. The pedagogical coordinator works with the teachers to address specific needs and strategies of the children, and additional educators would be assigned to support all children, with responsibility for the child with special rights.
I've been reading several books about assessment this year, and am learning to look for what a child is showing during assessment, rather that looking for what I expected. I try to put what I notice into the portfolio log for the families. Leslie Gleim, who writes often on the Reggio-Listserv, seems expert in Reggio-Inspired education for all children. I suggest you contact her.
Thank you for the information about examiner.com. I looked a bit at your page, and plan to look more when I'm not falling asleep. I had no idea our ning was being promoted by wikipedia. It was surprising to see my classroom on your page, too. I'm glad you think it is beautiful.
What is an examiner?