Review article
Children’s and teachers’ learning together in a preschool project
Marcela Batistič Zorec
; Faculty of Education, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia
Abstract
In postmodern times, it is impossible to seek universal truths in education that would be constant and valid for all times and places. Therefore, the basis for our decision-making in education is the question of how we – adults – see ‘the child’ and ‘childhood’, what we call subjective theories of teachers. In this article, I start from the view of the child as a powerless and help-needing individual, an ‘empty vessel’ into which we ‘pour’ knowledge. An alternative to this perception is the competent child, especially stressed in the Reggio Emilia approach. The Reggio Emilia preschool teachers include participation of children to their work and they believe that in educational process everybody learn: not only children but the adults also. In a related research and education project at the Faculty of Education at the University of Ljubljana (2009–2013), we encouraged about 200 Slovenian teachers to introduce the Reggio Emilia elements to their preschool practice. I will illustrate and analyse the idea of the competent child and children’s participation in preschool with the remarkable project: how the children and their teachers from the Globoko Preschool together and with the aid of film director, schoolchildren and janitor made a cartoon. I believe that such experience can be a motivation and challenge for preschool workers to embrace the children’s participation and to learn together with children.
Keywords
subjective theories of preschool teachers; competent child; Reggio Emilia approach; participation of children; learning together
Hrčak ID:
178258
URI
Publication date:
16.12.2016.
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