Vignettes focusing on emergent curriculum

Learn how to connect your curriculum planning to children's interests and thinking. With this book, educators will discover a systematic way for using documentation to design curriculum that emerges from children's inquiries, what they wonder, and what they want to understand. Get strategies for designing a classroom environment at the start of the year to facilitate emergent inquiry curriculum. Each chapter guides teachers to document and reflect on their thinking through each of the five phases of a cycle of inquiry process, including observing, interpreting the meaning of the play they see, and developing questions to engage children.

Helps providers implement proven child-centered curricular practices while meeting early learning standards.

"Guidance for implementing play-based emergent curriculum in preschool classrooms, gaining teachers' and families' support, and using emergent curriculum to build school readiness"--

Emergent curriculum in early childhood education refers to the process of using the spontaneity generated in the daily life of the children and adults in the program, along with teacher planning, to develop the curriculum. This book presents a story about a year in the life of a fictional child care center as a context for the discussion of emergent curriculum in 22 chapters arranged to cover events sequentially throughout the school year. Chapter 1 introduces the fictional child care setting. Chapters 2 through 21 alternately provide staff meeting topics, ideas, and examples of guided discussions; and ideas and discussions of class activities, field trips, and visits to various sites. Chapter 22, "Epilogue: Talking It Over," contains reflections on the activities and learning during the year by staff and students. Contains a section of notes for each chapter and 23 suggestions for further reading. (DR)

The long-awaited new edition of NAEYC's book Developmentally Appropriate Practice in Early Childhood Programs is here, fully revised and updated! Since the first edition in 1987, it has been an essential resource for the early childhood education field. Early childhood educators have a professional responsibility to plan and implement intentional, developmentally appropriate learning experiences that promote the social and emotional development, physical development and health, cognitive development, and general learning competencies of each child served. But what is developmentally appropriate practice (DAP)? DAP is a framework designed to promote young children's optimal learning and development through a strengths-based approach to joyful, engaged learning. As educators make decisions to support each child's learning and development, they consider what they know about (1) commonality in children's development and learning, (2) each child as an individual (within the context of their family and community), and (3) everything discernible about the social and cultural contexts for each child, each educator, and the program as a whole. This latest edition of the book is fully revised to underscore the critical role social and cultural contexts play in child development and learning, including new research about implicit bias and teachers' own context and consideration of advances in neuroscience. Educators implement developmentally appropriate practice by recognizing the many assets all young children bring to the early learning program as individuals and as members of families and communities. They also develop an awareness of their own context. Building on each child's strengths, educators design and implement learning settings to help each child achieve their full potential across all domains of development and across all content areas.

Child-centered lesson planning provides a system to strengthen teaching. Great lesson planning helps teachers to choose a range of strategies that match what children are learning and doing-- from directed mini-lessons to facilitated group activities.

In exploring the image of children and environments and thinking about ways in which pedagogy empowers children to be active and inquisitive learners in early learning environments, Empowering Pedagogy for Early Childhood Education is intended to create dialogue about how learning and development take place. The text introduces the reader to research and perspectives from many disciplines, and attempts to provide a contemporary view of how early learning programs, when designed to support children's authentic interests and embrace their sense of wonder, can empower children to be inquisitive, lifelong learners.

Explore STEM concepts through making and tinkering!

Theory meets practical tips in this guide for leaders of early childhood programs