Innovations

in early education: the international reggio exchange

PUBLISHED BY THE MERRILL-PALMER INSTITUTE, WAYNE STATE UNIVERSITY

My Nose is as Full as a World:

` Exploring the Smells of
THE QUARTERLY
PERIODICAL OF THE

the City
NORTH AMERICAN
REGGIO EMILIA
By Daniela Lanzi and Mirca Neroni

ALLIANCE
Daniela Lanzi is a pedagogista (education coordinator) and a member of the
pedagogical team of the Istituzione Scuole e Nidi d'Infanzia in Reggio
vol. 12, no. 1
Emilia. Mirca Neroni is the atelierista (studio teacher) at Balducci Preschool.
Winter 2005
This article is based on a presentation during a session of the 2004 interna-

WHAT’S INSIDE
To Know a Cricket:
Exploring the
Sounds of the School
NAREA Column
The Challenge of Diversity:
Continuing the Dialogue
Conference Calendar
New Resources
“The Hundred Languages of
Children” Exhibit Schedule
tional study tour, titled "The Town of Reggio Emilia, Its Community and Its
Context: Experiences of Participation and Projects in Evolution." In addition
to Daniela and Mirca, Paola Cavazzoni (pedagogista, Istituzione Scuole e
Nidi d'Infanzia) and Alexander Scillitani (film director) participated in this
presentation. During the 2004 International Conference in Reggio, "Crossing
Boundaries: Narrating the Possible," a related session titled, "Town In
Waiting" was one of 11 concurrent sessions that took place in different places
in the town. The contributors to that session were: Andrea Branzi (architect
and designer, associate professor, Faculty of Industrial Design, Politecnico di
Milano), Mara Davoli (atelierista, Neruda preschool), Tiziana Filippini
(pedagogical coordinator, Istituzione Scuole e Nidi d'Infanzia), Annalia
Galardini (director of Education, Social Services and Cultural Affairs,
Commune di Pistoia), Amelia Gambetti (Reggio Children coordinator,
Istituzione Scuole e Nidi d'Infanzia board member), Lorena Lucenti
(teacher, Panda infant-toddler center), Evelina Reverberi (teacher, Diana
preschool), Mirella Ruozzi (atelierista, Laboratorio G. Rodari), Denis
Santachiara (designer) and Milena Zanti (teacher, Balducci preschool). The
editors of Innovations would like to thank the translator, Jane McCall, for
her contribution to the publication of this article.

continued on next page

 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
La Citta in Attesa/The City in Waiting
During the 2001-2002 school year, all of the Reggio
municipal infant-toddler centers and preschools par-
ticipated in a project called "La Citta in Attesa" or "The
City in Waiting." The project arose when the city
decided to celebrate the 30-year anniversary of the
publication of Gianni Rodari's book, The Grammar of
Fantasy, which he had dedicated to the city of Reggio
Emilia. The city wanted to pay homage to Gianni
Rodari, who had written the book while he was
visiting Reggio Emilia in 1972, encountering and
meeting with children, parents and teachers from the
municipal infant-toddler center and preschools. In this
book, Rodari explores values cherished by the Reggio
educators, such as aesthetic pleasure, transformation,
creativity, marvel, joy and a sense of humor. We
believe that all of these qualities contribute to
knowledge building in children and adults.
In the course of this project, the educators in Reggio
Emilia decided to reflect on the value of these key
words with our present day teachers and our young
children. The ideas of creativity and transformation
are not new to our schools. These values have been
key to our experience from the very beginning but we
wanted to raise our awareness of how these factors
related to our work in different processes at the
present time. We also wanted to create a closer
relationship between creativity, transformation and
the city itself, as a physical entity. We asked ourselves
a question: In their encounter with the city, how do
We tried to consider the city as a
kind of enormous workshop where
we could carry out projects, where
modification and changes could be
made . . . a workshop that would
welcome the suggestions of children
and adults. -Daniela Lanzi
– 2 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
children and adults observe in ways that that are
transformational, metaphoric and creative? We tried
to consider the city as a kind of enormous workshop
where we could carry out projects, where modifica-
tion and changes could be made . . . a workshop that
would welcome the suggestions of children and
adults. In our educational project as a network of
schools, there has always been a strong dialogue
between our work in the schools and the city itself.
The school and the city are in a dynamic relationship,
in which children and adults are not just part of the
relationship but also an expression of the city. The
reflections and manifestations of our project were
made visible in a final exhibition on May 12, 2002,
and became a concrete way of seeing our project and
the way it had developed. There was a tangible effect
on the city, which everyone could see and investigate,
and which declared the identity of the school and
the children.
During this long-term investigation, there were three
places inside the city that were transformed by the
children's thinking and way of seeing. These were the
public park (near the Municipal Theater), vicolo Trivelli
(a very narrow street on the way to the city center)
and via Farini (the street that connects the main
square of the city near City Hall with another large
space near the public library, via Garibaldi). The
encounter of the children with the city was made
visible in May 2002 through installations in these
three places, which included the reflections of the
children and actual concrete objects that the children
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
had created. So the city was waiting that day, not just
for those who traverse its streets, for whom the city
waits every day. The city was also waiting for the
transformation of the city by the children. The city
knew that projects had been taking place in its streets
for months and months, that the children had been
investigating areas of the city for a long time, and that
the thoughts of the children and the adults would be
made manifest on that day. The thoughts and ideas
of the children are very important because they
remind us that we are not only interested in the final
results of a project, but also in all the variations and
stages of the process that take place.
There were many long-term projects that resulted
from encounters between the children and via Farini
in various infant-toddler centers and preschools. The
way the children encountered via Farini offered a new
way of looking and experiencing the street. As a result
of this way of looking at the street, we arrived at the
realization that beauty, aesthetics and caring for the
place where we live are important parts of recognizing
our citizenship and our belonging to a place. We tried
to concentrate on what possibilities the street might
offer to the children. We knew that the pathways of
this project were to be made visible at the end of the
year. When we explored the streets with the children,
we thought about how we might be able to make the
children's explorations visible. The expectations and
imaginings of the teachers for these experiences on
via Farini were far inferior to what was elaborated by
the children. Experiencing via Farini with the children
transformed the way that we saw the street.
In the municipal infant-toddler centers and preschools,
the teachers use many forms of note taking during
the course of a project, in order to document the
children's hypotheses, which are expressed through
words and graphic representation. These writings have
a very changeable nature and are useful when teach-
ers want to make their own predictions about what
might happen next in a project. They are also useful
for defining the central issues of an exploration. The
material collected during the course of our investiga-
tions is regularly discussed as the project evolves, in
order to exchange different points of view. These
discussions are used as opportunities for professional
development with the teachers but the parents and
children also participate in dialogues of this kind. In
this case, the material collected was also the topic of
– 3 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
discussion groups among educators of the 12 infant-
toddler centers and preschools that participated in the
via Farini experience.
It is very important for us to have these different occa-
sions for debating and discussing the material because
of the opportunities they offer for changing points of
view and for changing strategies during the course of
our ongoing projects. It is important to have material
to discuss together because we have to make a lot of
choices about what we want to use to make our
learning visible to other people. Very often, teachers
must ask themselves the question: What do we want
to choose, among all of these different possibilities, to
inquire into more deeply and to investigate together
with the children? Questions like this belong to the
profession of teachers; they are part of our job. In our
opinion, this question may be one of the most difficult:
Do our choices enable others to follow the learning
process of the children and the adults together?
"My Nose is as Full as a World"
The four and five year old children of the Balducci
Preschool were the protagonists or central figures in an
exploration of via Farini we have titled, "My Nose
is as Full as a World." This research project sought to
discover how cities could be explored by the children's
gaze, by their hypotheses, their words and sugges-
tions. In Reggio Tutta: The Guide to the City, Sandra
Piccinini (president, Istituzione Scuole e Nidi d'Infanzia)
wrote, "For the children, the map of 'all Reggio' is one
you can touch, smell, taste and traverse in the
different rhythms of running and walking, 'on the tip
of your toe' . . . For the children, the city is, above
all, an existential place where one's own identity is
developed in a relational experience with objects and
with other people."
The relationship between the children and the city has
always been discussed inside our schools for the rich-
ness, the complexity and the possibilities of inquiry that
it offers. This relationship highlights the networking
nature of all the schools inside the city. Our encounter
with via Farini began with a conversation regarding the
children's outings in the city with their parents:
I go into the city with my parents and we get bread when
we don't have any at home.
When I am in the big square in the town, I buy a sweet
pastry with cream inside it.
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
It is quite common for a project in our schools to
have its genesis with a conversation. We have tried
over the years to use conversations to interpret
ways of building knowledge and not only to find
out who knows what. We also think that conversa-
tion has a political value. It isn't only a good tech-
nique for improving the ability to communicate. It
is also a way of offering the children tools for
accessing a greater participation in the life of the
city.
We continued our dialogue with an inquiry, in ver-
bal and graphic form, into the meaning of the
word "via" or "street." The street was the context,
in which the children were going to carry out their
inquiry. The teachers decided to respond to a
reflection that the children had made. The adults
asked themselves this question: Is this type of ini-
tial inquiry, using words and using drawings, the
most meaningful way that we can begin a project
with the children? In this specific case, is it the
most meaningful way to begin a project about the
city?
The teachers asked the children:
What is a street?
What are streets for?
Do they have a name?
The children responded:
Streets are roads that have a name.
Streets need names to be recognized but they're
named for very old, important people who are dead
now or very good inventors.
Streets are very long roads.
A street is a small narrow road where there are
houses and gates.
Some streets are made straight and some with
bends.
Our street has its own name. Its name is via Farini.
Then the teachers asked other questions:
Do you know via Farini?
Why do you think it has this name?
The children responded:
You know, my mommy goes to have coffee in via
Farini. Yes, near where the lion square is.
It's called the same as flour [farina]. There might be
– 4 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
some flour. There might be some cooks making flour.
There are probably some mills, too, for making flour.
Via Farini? I recognized it right away because I've
been down there lots of times with mommy when I
go into the city center.
The project began to take a concrete form with the
first outings by the children into the street. Their ways
of observing enabled them to construct different ways
of imagining, to explore the urban landscape using all
their senses. During the research pathway the children
chose, they gave us multi-sensorial ways of under-
standing and interpreting the street. Looking at the
gestures, at the ways of seeing and at the words that
the children used, the adults began to try and
construct an interpretation of the children's ways of
exploring the street.
It is quite common for a project in our
schools to have its genesis with a
conversation. We have tried
over the years to use conversations
to interpret ways of building knowledge
and not only to find out who knows what.
We also think that conversation
has a political value.
It isn't only a good technique for improv-
ing the ability to communicate.
It is also a way of offering the children
tools for accessing a
greater participation in the life of the city.
-Mirca Neroni
The teachers organized the children's reflections while
investigating the street according to several indicators:
• spatial orientation and personal knowledge
If you turn ‘round that way, you can see the piazza
with all the pigeons in it.
This is via Farini. Look, there are old houses in the
street and there's the bend down there at the end,
too.
Look, there is the sign, which says "via Farini."
• unusual ways of looking and seeing
There are windows in the street but nobody's behind
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
them. They're made of iron, these windows, and you
can smell spiders and spiders' webs.
• road surfaces
It's shining! They come awake! Look, there's gold and
there's silver!
There's such strange types of tiles on the floor with a
very hard, hard sand in between them.
• paths for play
The sidewalk [footpath] is made of bricks. You put
your feet on it. It's made up of feet and marching. It's
somebody who's marching along the street. Charge!
• color features
It's all different colors. It's red; it's orange. What they
wanted to do is make a city with all colors in it.
• characteristics of smell
Mmm, smell that! Smell that perfume of vanilla!
I can smell foam. I can smell cake. Mmm, little cakes
with jam inside them.
It's a bar! Can you smell the coffee? Can you smell
the cappuccino? This makes me hungry!
I can smell the truck going past. It was a horrible
smell.
I can smell a beautiful smell. I can smell lemon and
chamomile.
In these first outings together with the children, there
were many different paths we could have chosen to
take. But we felt that the idea that characterized the
children's outings most strongly was the children's
interpretation of the street through their sense of
smell. So we, as teachers, chose this focus for explor-
ing the street with the children. Why did we make this
choice? Besides the strong suggestions of the children,
we also liked the challenge of exploring in a way that
was not very common to our experience in the school.
We believed the olfactory features of the street offered
us a possibility for creating new contexts for explo-
ration and interpretation. We also believed that the
idea of smell is related to knowledge and knowledge
building. A sense of smell is something we have from
the day we are born. It offers us a holistic way of inter-
preting the world. In his book, Il Profumo, Patrick
Suskind says of a child, "He woke up first with his
nose. His little nose moved, stretched upwards and
smelled. It was as if the child could see with his nos-
trils, as if he were looking carefully and inquisitively, in
a more penetrating way than he could have done with
his eyes. As if, with his nose, he was devouring some-
thing coming from himself. He was smelling himself."
– 5 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
At this point, the hypotheses that the children had for-
mulated suggested that we begin to think about the
street in a more complex way, to look at smells in a
wider context, and to try and trace some first bio-
graphical notes regarding the children's thoughts
about the sense of smell.
Smell as a dimension to explore and discover.
You can never see a smell. It's light and the air carries it
away.
You can't see a smell but you can smell it.
My nose is as full as a world!
Smell as a code for knowledge, which together with
the other senses, helps us to reconstruct the complexi-
ty of knowledge. Smell as a system of relations, which
gives identity back to things, to people and to places.
Everything has its own smell. But light and glass can't
have a smell. They don't smell of anything.
Riccardo is different because he has the smell of his skin.
You can tell it's via Farini by the smell and you can smell
it before you get to the street.
This code for recognizing places through smell allows
the children to begin to develop an olfactory map for
recognizing places. In this way, the children declared
how smell can be used as a code for knowledge and
for learning.
A nose is something you use for breathing. Smells and
perfumes go into your nose. Then they go into your
tummy and they come out through your navel.
Sometimes they come out of your mouth or go in through
your mouth. They go everywhere, smells.
I can feel smells inside me. Smells don't come out because
the skin holds them in near to my bones.
The smell goes into your nose, up to your brain and then
it tells you the answers to things.
We have to suck in with our noses.
What if we go into via Farini and capture all the smells?
The children once again encountered the olfactory
qualities of the street when we returned to via Farini to
capture old smells. We wanted to capture the smells in
order to get to know them better. This close, interwo-
ven dialogue between the children and the world of
smells began with the assumption that smells are
unstable and provisional, very difficult to capture and
especially difficult to hold. It is from this premise about
smells that the children germinated different hypothe-
ses. Through discussion of the various possibilities
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —

together, the children's ideas entered into relationship
and contributed to a common, shared strategy.
To capture the smells, we can make a sack.
We need a floppy, big nose to capture the smells.
Or we could take a bottle, put the bottle where we
smelled the smell, capture the smell in the bottle and
then close it with a cork.
I think we need some transparent tools with handles on
them. Then we'll throw them up high to capture the
perfume smells.
We need a Hoover!
Let's prepare a smell-capturing machine!
This idea was instantly a winner, one in which the chil-
dren wanted to participate. They decided to invent
and create machines for capturing and transforming
smells.
Let's make a machine for capturing and transforming
smells!
We don't want to have these fake ideas of what we can
do! We'll never be able to capture smells!
But you can, you can! You get something that sucks up
the smells!
Yeah, then the machine would explode with all those
smells inside it.
No, because we'll make it big!
If you make it too big, you'll break the road into pieces.
The people living on via Farini will get very angry if the
smells disappear from their street.

The children created designs for a machine that would capture and transform the smells.

I'm going to make it in the shape of a truck with a tube, which

breathes in. I'm going to make the tube a round spiral with a
spring inside it. And then I'm going to give it an antenna that
communicates with a sound, which makes a signal: Beep, beep,
beep, beep. This sound means that the machine has found a smell
and is sucking it in.

There are two tubes. One for nice smells and one for bad smells.
After the machine has captured the smells, the machine will throw
them back into the city. But only the nice smells will come back in
our city. The horrible smells will be transported into another city.

I want to put some wheels on my machine so it can go into the city. I

want to put a seat inside it so you can ride inside the machine and
drive it. In the tummy of the machine, I'm going to put a big cage to
hold all the smells inside.

– 6 –
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —

I would like to build a machine made out of iron with wings and
four wheels. This machine catches smells, then it goes into
museums and lets you smell good smells and bad smells. They
will even come from America and from all the countries in the
world to smell our smells.

The smells go into small jars and are not mixed, otherwise a
smell that doesn't exist will come out and the machine will
blow up . . . then there is a monitor that tells what the smell
is: if it's bitter, sharp, sweet . . .

A tube that goes into lots of other tubes, and after goes to the
final tube where there is a box where the smells go. The box has
a round cork and after there's a button, you push the button and
then it closes.

It has two legs that hold it still, that way it doesn't go away. It
has two antennas that are used to turn the buttons on and
off. To catch a lot of the different scents, I filled up eight bags.

The teachers decided to fill small jars with substances
that had different essences and smells. The intention
was to offer the children a pause for thought and
reflection. We wanted to give back to the children a
palette of smells, which they had evoked through
their words while discussing their encounter with via
Farini. The teachers encouraged the children to try to
understand the special characteristics of the smell as
well as the elements that make up the smell. We
wanted them to talk about what the smell reminds
them of and what comes to mind when they smell it.
In the entrance to our school, we set up a "smelling
area" to offer visitors to the school, parents and
grandparents, the opportunity to participate in our
inquiry. Part of the children's learning pathway with
the smells included their desire to represent the
smells in a graphic way, through their drawings. The
teachers asked:
What smells would we like to draw from via Farini?
Is it possible to draw a smell?
We felt that drawing might be a strategy that would
give the children a way of forming a concrete
elaboration around something that is invisible and
intangible. The children decided to graphically
represent the smells that occurred most frequently
in their explorations. Together, the children listed
adjectives that describe these smells.

– 7 –
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —

The smell of coffee is: cylinder was the ability to hold inside or make visible
hard subtle disgusting the characteristics of smells that the children had
strong warm amazing described: the smell of coffee, cigarettes, cookies and
flowers. A long strip of paper was prepared, listing all
bitter a little bit burnt
of the adjectives the children had used to refer to
sour tasty
these four smells and it was placed on the outside of
the cylinder. The children also wanted to include the
The nasty smell of cigarettes is:
idea of transparency in the cylinder design so that
bothersome horrible
you could see the smell while smelling the smell. The
nasty rotten children's proposal of combining material and smells
black long in the olfactometer gave a more tangible form to the
stinky dirty suggestions they had around the idea of smells.
soggy It makes you sneeze and it makes
you a little bit sleepy. We presented the olfactometer to the entire class in
a little bit bitter
order to collect comments and evaluations from the
The nice smell of cookies is: other children about whether this olfactometer really
does its job.
delicious dripping
It's a smell that you can smell.
soft exquisite
It's a smell that you can see.
appetizing smooth
It's a smell, which tells a story.
light open
It's a smell, which tells a story and has its own memory.
good My nose is lighting up!
sweetish We also created gifts for the parents in the form of four
different posters with individual drawings of the differ-
The lovely smell of flowers is:
ent smells the children felt characterized via Farini:
transparent light sweet coffee, cigarettes, cookies and flowers. The material we
delicate very wet full of colors collected during this exploration of via Farini was orga-
lovely round nized into folders. One folder was especially dedicated
I capture the smell with my nose. Then it went into my to the words of the children and to their drawings.
brain and made me feel happy. Another folder was kept for photographic material of
the outings to the street, and of the discussions and
The idea of smell that the children gave us was one elaborations inside the school. Another folder was kept
that can be captured and represented, and one that is for the materials that all the adults, teachers and
livable. The teachers wondered: How can we give a parents, were able to collect on the subject of smells.
shape to the children's thoughts and to their ideas? At
this point, the inquiry and exploration of the children On May 12, 2002, our investigation of via Farini, along
and the adults became closely interwoven. The teach- with those of all the infant-toddler centers and
ers "loaned" the children ideas, materials and, also, preschools, were made visible in the city through the
their hands. We often use the strategy of offering our transformations of the children. Our olfactometer was a
assistance, in the form of our thoughts and skills, or part of this transformational experience. We decided to
actual tools and materials, at times when we feel our call this initiative "La Citta in Attesa," because it means
intervention might be useful for the learning processes (in Italian, it is a play on words) "the city was waiting
of the children. This loan can help the children make for the unexpected."
their ideas visible. We know that the assistance that we
give to the children will be "returned" through their Some of the children's reflections about this experience:
regained momentum, achieved progress or acquired There were some little holes with noses drawn on them so
knowledge. children could play at putting their noses in the holes and
smelling the smells. They did it because they thought it
A small group of children decided to embark on a was a fun thing to do.
design project for a large cylinder that we called an I can smell smells that I had never smelled before. And I
"olfactometer." One of the desired features of this recognized them by smelling them.

– 8 –
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —

TO KNOW A CRICKET:
Exploring the Sounds of the
School by Alise Shafer in collaboration with Patricia Hunter McGrath and Fabiane Wilson

Alise Shafer has been the director of Evergreen Community School in Santa Monica, California for 20
years. She has participated in six study tours to Reggio Emilia. Patricia McGrath has been the atelierista
[studio teacher] at Evergreen Community School for seven years and, prior to that, was a teacher at The
Growing Place in Santa Monica for six years. Patricia has participated in three study tours to Reggio
Emilia. Fabiane Wilson has been a teacher at Evergreen Community School for the past two years.

while time and place cannot be replicated, neither

can an experience. Yet we can learn from the stories
of others, though less about the story than about the
way the teachers reflected on their own context.

Our story begins in the beach city of Santa Monica,

From a window, often shrouded in fog, we glimpse
this place across an ocean where children romp in the
piazza with their grandparents and where, on a chilly
winter morning, the smell of warm pasta permeates
the school. We take copious notes there, attempting
to capture something we will later awkwardly try to
articulate. Perhaps if we write it all, like taking pho-
tographs, we will capture its soul - we will at last
come to know it.
I page through a pile of notebooks full of words and
sketches, quotes and reflections from my six trips to
Reggio Emilia. I smile to notice that my notes are
sparser from my later trips. There is no less to learn
but somehow I understand that there is less to copy.
Back home, hundreds of visitors come to Evergreen
Community School for conferences, workshops and
visitation days. They, too, fill notebooks with ideas
and leave with cameras full of photos. They ask very
specific questions about particular investigations, as if
they hope to reproduce the experience with their own
children. It is from this vantage point, through the
window as well as from the inside of a working
school, that I have come to understand without a
shred of doubt that every experience is firmly rooted
in a place, a time, a moment - like no other. And
where the housing is dense and greenery is at a
premium, and where the occasional bug, sometimes
spotted under a rock, is a source of great intrigue and
delight. It is here in this sprawling, mostly concrete
city that our story unfolds. While, ultimately, this is a
story of an elusive cricket and how it captured the
imagination and affection of a group of four-year-old
children, the story really begins several days before
there was ever the slightest knowledge that a cricket
could be sharing our school with us. Our story begins
with a vision of a spaceship, of all things.
Five children, who wanted to build a spaceship, had
been meeting for several days with their teacher,
Fabiane, and with me, the director of the school.
I imagine that children all over the industrial world
dream of spaceships. I wonder if space travel is simply
a metaphor for all the journeys that we take into
worlds unknown. Young children seem particularly
drawn to these worlds. Perhaps because they have
so little knowledge of space, it can be a place where
reality and fantasy can exist simultaneously, where
they can move freely between what they know and
what they imagine. It is a place where play and
science, magic and metaphor gracefully collide. As
educators, we attempt to follow and support these

– 9 –
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
journeys, understanding the strong pull the children
feel to explore the unknown.
On a Monday morning in early October, Fabiane and
the children venture down three flights of stairs to an
underground parking structure, where we have a
large storage closet. They emerge with an enormous
plastic chest full of loose parts: pvc pipe, wooden
planks, screen and a steering wheel. Satisfied with
their bounty, they laboriously haul the chest up the
long, metal staircase to the atelier [studio]. The
following day, they meet with Patricia, the atelierista,
to share their treasures and spaceship plans. As their
ideas begin to surface, so does a sound - a most
mysterious sound!
This is where our story takes an unexpected turn, one
that we could not have predicted. Indeed, we have
found that our best teaching happens when we are
not so invested in one direction, that we are blind to
new paths that beckon. For the eight months that fol-
lowed, we viewed this exploration, as we do all of our
work, as a series of mini-stories that together make a
whole. Looking at our work in this way enables us to
closely follow the children and prevents us from
deciding what will happen before it happens. We
have learned not to look for "projects," for they are
likely to have defined directions. We have found that
our openness helps us to listen better to the children.
The sound in the atelier continues, enticing the
children away from their meeting. In whispers and on
tiptoe, the children scour the room, looking for the
source of the sound. What could be making this high-
– 10 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
pitched chirping that distracts
the children from their spaceship
plans? Is it a humming bird, a spider, a
cricket? Just when they are sure they
are getting closer to the sound, it seems to
come from another place across the room. So
the quest begins - a quest to explain a mystery
of a world unknown. Perhaps we had not ven-
tured so far from the spaceship study after all!
The search continues for days in a somewhat disorga-
nized manner. The following week, Nate, one of the
children from the spaceship group, thinks he hears
the same sound late at night in his bedroom. Armed
with a tape recorder, he and his mother follow the
noise all the way out to their dark garden. They sit
quietly and tape the high-pitched chirping. How
strange it feels to hear the same sound at home! At
school the next morning, Nate plays the recording,
which he describes as a "krr-krr-krr." But Annabel is
doubtful. She is certain the sound she is hearing is a
"brr-brr-brr." Jackson concludes that there could be
two different kinds of bugs, and they are both living
in our atelier!
As the months pass, this small group of children
proceed to collect clues, piece together pertinent
facts and develop theories that might explain and
ultimately harness the noise. What was, at first, a
disorganized search party becomes a systemized
hunt. All the while, their classmates, who are involved
in other small group experiences, eagerly await news
about the bug mystery. For eight months, the emo-
tional and cognitive tension is high - one fuelling the
other. There are times that the sound seems so close
and yet the children cannot capture it. Other times,
it is barely audible or completely absent. The children
can neither control nor predict its presence.
The children's drive seems basic, almost instinctive.
After all, the hunter-prey relationship is part of the
human story. While the children mean the sound no
harm, they have an insatiable desire to know it - to
understand its origin. Is it a guest, an intruder, a new
but now permanent fixture? The children do not
know what to think about a sound that suddenly fills
their living space - a sound that had not been there
before.
One day, while the group is in the atelier discussing
their capturing strategies, someone spots a large hop-
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
ping bug! Could this be the source of the sound?
After a 15-minute pursuit, full of whispers, squeals
and squeamish jumps, the children manage to sur-
round the bug in one corner of the room. A bucket is
lowered and the insect is caught. With ears and eyes
wide open, the children listen . . . and listen . . . and
listen. If this is the source of the mysterious chirping,
surely they will hear it sing in the bucket! But the
silence of the room is all that can be heard. That is,
until Jordan asks, "What if it's poisonous? It could bite
your hand and you could die!"
This possibility sends a wave of excitement and
fear through the children. Gillian runs to the
classroom to find a book on insects to help
with identification. The teachers are
pleased that a child has initiated the
use of books at this point. Too often,
teachers introduce books early in
an exploration, precluding the
possibility of children construct-
ing their own theories first. For
example, what would have
happened if I had identified the
noise as a cricket on the first
day they heard it, and supplied
the children with a book on
crickets? Then we could have
launched a thematic study of
crickets, learning about their
eating habits, their habitats and
their life cycles. Instead, we have
learned to follow the children's theories
and look for deeper concepts rather than
thematic topics. How do you catch an
elusive, moving sound that you can neither see nor
identify?
With the help of the book, the children discover that
the bug in question is a grasshopper and that it isn't
poisonous. But we still don't know if the grasshopper
is what made the sound in the atelier. Mimi proposes
that they take the insect back to the classroom for
further observation. Together, the children watch
closely and listen attentively. It is not long before
they realize they have taken the wrong hostage.
The children begin to notice that there are many
different bugs inside and outside of the school. With
the aid of the same book, the children discover that
there are crickets in the garden, the yard and the
– 11 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
parking structure. They also learn about the sounds
that crickets make. As a result, the children are now
fairly certain that they are searching for a cricket and
that a cricket is the source of the mysterious sound in
the atelier.
That morning, there is much to report back to the
larger group. Reflection meetings are held daily,
following our morning work time. It is then that the
children have an opportunity to report back on the
work that took place that morning, enabling the rest
of the class to be part of the experience. The larger
group asks questions about the work, often adding
new ideas and perspectives to be explored on
subsequent days. Sometimes the reflection
meeting becomes an entry point for a
child who was not part of the origi-
nal group but now feels she would
like to participate. Most impor-
tantly, new ideas and voices keep
the work alive and dynamic.
During the reflection meeting,
Maya, hearing of the group's
grasshopper capture, has an
interesting idea. "If you had
more people in the [sound]
group, one person could stand
on that side of the atelier, the
other person could stand on the
other side of the atelier, and the
other persons could stand on all
the sides of the atelier. Then if you
see it, you try to catch it but if it goes
to the other side, the other person tries to
catch it."
Maya's suggestion seems reasonable. Indeed the
children had struggled with the vastness of the 1200-
square foot atelier. Perhaps the "divide and conquer"
solution will be more fruitful than running from one
side of the room to another clutching buckets, only to
find that the sound has moved again. To encourage
the children to think more systematically about the
placement of children in the atelier, the teachers draw
a map of the room. The children are invited to use
the map as a tool to more easily visualize, record and
discuss their plans. Following this first schematic
drawing, dozens of other drawings are initiated by
the children, who find this to be a useful device for
publicly conveying and discussing an idea. Often
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
Reflection meetings are held daily,
following our morning work time.
It is then that the children have an opportunity
to report back on the work that took place
that morning, enabling the rest of the class
to be part of the experience.
The larger group asks questions about the work,
often adding new ideas and perspectives
to be explored on subsequent days.
Sometimes the reflection meeting becomes
an entry point for a child
who was not part of the original group
but now feels she would like to participate.
Most importantly, new ideas and voices
keep the work alive and dynamic.
copies of the original map are covered with acetate
overlays so the children can compare and contrast
their many plans.
Megan's strategy is to divide the room into three
sections, with two people per section designated on
her schematic with the children's initials. She instructs silently wait for the cricket to appear. Seconds feel
the children to take their places and conduct a
thorough search of their specified area, scouring the
shelves, tabletops and hidden corners, all to no avail.
As a result of this failed search effort, Maya surmises
that the children aren't looking from the right vantage
point. She proposes a plan that will allow the children
to have an aerial view of the entire room at once:
"We'll use a ladder!" One by one, the children climb
up the ladder, where they scan the room from above.
Still, the source of the noise remains as elusive as ever.
The children agree that they will return to the original
idea of adding more people to cover the vast atelier.
Even as they redraw their plans, dividing up the atelier
into quadrants and recalculating the numbers, the
chirping taunts them, keeping the drama high and
ever-fuelling their motivation.
Late one morning at a reflection meeting, Noah raises
a provocative question, "Where would you hide if you
were a cricket?" The question hangs in the air with a
– 12 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
serious pause. Much like the hunter
who must know the habits of his prey,
the children must know the ways of
the cricket in order to find it. At once,
they understand that they must think
from the cricket's perspective. The
entire class shuffles into the atelier,
drops to the ground and slithers
through the room to places they think
a cricket might go.
Meanwhile, Nate is developing
another plan. He decides that the
space under the tables is a good place
for children to stand guard undetect-
ed. He suggests two guards hide under
every table in the atelier. With great
effort and much input from his group,
the tables are counted and the
calculation is done. The children
conclude that there are nine tables,
and if they want to have two guards
per table, they will need 19 children. Nate laboriously
glues the names of classmates onto his map so there
will be no confusion about who is assigned to each
table. Eventually, when the evidence of a miscalcula-
tion is undeniable, the numbers are recalculated and
corrected. Eighteen children take their posts and
like minutes and the minutes feel like hours as they
wait patiently under the tables, but there is no cricket
activity.
After several weeks, countless schematic drawings
and no luck finding the insect, the children conclude
that they will need a net and a lure. Noah, who had
previously asked the question, "Where would you
hide if you were a cricket?" now asks another
provocative question, "If you were a cricket, what
kind of food would you like to eat?" After careful
consideration, the children conclude that crickets eat
"fruits, pizza, corn, bread, grass or flowers." The
children write a letter to their parents, asking for food
for the cricket. The following day, we have many
donations of flowers, bread and corn. The bait is
carefully placed on the net and left there overnight.
The children are eager to return the next morning to
see if their new strategy is successful. Surely there will
be a net full of crickets!
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
A surprise does indeed wait for us the next morning,
though it wasn't what the children or the teachers
expected. We found no crickets laying in the net, but
the corn and flowers definitely look different. The
teachers quietly assume that the food simply shriveled
up or dried out in the night, but the children are
convinced otherwise. The children believe that the
crickets have taken the bait away! They are very
pleased that the cricket had visited during the night.
Noah is not surprised at the cricket's preference for
night: "They stay awake [at night] 'cause they don't
want to get killed by their predators." He continues,
"Like some predators are wolves, coyotes, you know."
The teacher asks Noah, "Wolves and coyotes [are]
hanging around the school at night?" Noah smiles at
the folly of this and quickly repairs his theory, adding
– 13 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
a measure of plausibility, "No, I mean real live animals
that are bigger have predators like that. These
[crickets] could have predators like bees, black
beetles, wasps and yellow jackets."
Noah speaks with certainty and is taken seriously by
his classmates. They wonder if they should come to
the school at night to catch these nocturnal insects
that dare not show themselves in the light of day, lest
their predators devour them. But not everyone thinks
they would be allowed to return to school at night
and some children think they would just be too tired.
Emma has a solution that she shares with the whole
group at a reflection meeting: "We're going to trick
[the cricket]. When it is night, we're going to put a
sun and a very bright light bulb . . . and when it is
daytime, we'll put a moon and an owl."
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
The other children are in favor of this idea and decide
to begin their trickery by creating murals that give
the illusion of day and night. With sketchbooks in
hand, they venture outside to look at and draw trees
that will eventually be part of their day and night
paintings. Their observational drawings are later
projected onto large canvases, which are hung on
the atelier walls.
In order to better see and understand the subtle
gradations of color and the infinite shades contained
in a single tree, the children explore the neighbor-
hood, taking digital photographs of their favorite
trees. Using the photos for inspiration, they paint
with great care and precision, paying close attention
to color choices and shape.
With the nighttime mural nearly complete, the
children decide that they need a big moon as a final
touch on their painting. The Class Two children had
recently spent many months writing and illustrating a
book called "The Moon Catchers." They are known
school-wide as experts in moon painting. Though the
"Moon Catcher" children are a full year younger, the
Class Three children recognize their expertise. Mimi is
sent to a meeting in Class Two to enlist their help
and finds plenty of volunteers. Everyone wants to be
– 14 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
in on the trickery and everyone wants to know just
who is making all that noise in the atelier! Michael,
from Class Two, who had worked so laboriously on
"The Moon Catcher" illustrations, is commissioned to
add the final touch to the night sky - a shimmering
full moon.
With the daytime mural still unfinished and gradua-
tion just two weeks away, Megan worries that they
are running out of time. Nearly every child in the
room is involved in some way, but still there is much
to do. She wonders if the children of Class Two
would be willing to finish the painting and catch the
cricket the next year, if the children of Class Three
cannot complete their mission by graduation. The
Class Two children are invited to a meeting to discuss
the possibility. Not surprisingly, their enthusiasm for
the project is great. Not only would they be happy to
take on the unfinished tasks if asked, but they have
many new ideas on how to catch the cricket. The
work has now crossed the boundaries between
classrooms and has become part of the culture of
our school. The experience belongs to everyone.
Comforted by the knowledge that Class Two will be
willing to carry the torch if necessary, the Class Three
children return to their painting with a sense of relief.
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
Still, the children work with dogged determination to
complete the murals.
Meanwhile, the teachers are aware that they have
not heard the mysterious noise in the atelier very
often during the past few months. In fact, at this
point in the investigation, the atelier is "quiet" though
the children are too busy with their plans to notice.
At first, we are not concerned. We know from experi-
ence that the crickets at Evergreen come and go with
the seasons, and are certain that they will return as
summer approaches. But will they return before the
end of the school year? While we don't think it is
necessary for the children to ultimately catch the
cricket, we want them to have the possibility for their
investigation to develop in this way. After much
discussion, the teachers make the decision to "stock"
the atelier with crickets. We see this move as
a provocation, a tool to help keep the search and the
passion alive. Unfortunately, stocking the atelier is
easier said than done! We soon learn that pet store
crickets, though cheap and plentiful, do not chirp!
With seemingly no other options available, Fabiane
goes into her garden night after night after night,
hunting down all the crickets she can find and
transport.
– 15 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
With just two days left in the school year, both the
daytime and the nighttime murals are complete.
Fabiane has surreptitiously made her final capture in
her garden and the atelier is now the new home of
several chirping crickets. Now the children can carry
out their plan to trick the cricket into view! They
decide that after morning meeting the next day, they
will remove the daytime mural, draw the blinds and
extinguish the lights. Using only their nighttime
image, they plan to create the illusion of night in the
atelier.
Early the next morning as children are still arriving,
Luke and his mom set the lunch tables in the atelier.
As they fold napkins and arrange silverware, Luke's
mother spots a cricket standing right in front of the
nighttime mural! Luke quickly captures it in a cup
and the news spreads like wildfire throughout the
school. With just Luke and his mom present during
the capture, this certainly is not the dramatic ending
everyone had hoped for, after an eight-month quest
to find the source of the mysterious noise. But the
children are satisfied that their plan has led to the
cricket's capture. After all, Emma explains, you can
imagine the cricket's confusion looking at both the
nighttime mural and the daytime mural sitting side
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —

DAY

NIGHT
by side. The cricket must have thought, "Should I go
back to sleep or should I stay up, should I go back to
sleep or should I stay up?" Yes, everyone agrees, they
had certainly confused the cricket into view.
At long last, the mysterious insect, who had taunted
and teased the children and playfully engaged in an
eight-month game of hide and seek, stands boldly
before them. The moment of encounter is sweet,
though they seem to know it will be brief. The
children know that a cricket cannot stay captive in
a cup. The children choose the spot in the garden
where just four months earlier, they had planted
flowers in memory of their teacher, Cindy Lefstad,
who had passed away after a battle with leukemia.
"Cindy loves this garden. She will take care of the
cricket," they said. So the cricket is once again where
it is meant to be, free in a garden - in Cindy's garden.
children seem to feel that there is no need to capture
the maker of these songs now, for it is enough to
know its source and to enjoy the music. We are left
to marvel at the energy of the children's pursuit and
their ability to continually find different approaches
to problem solving. The children experienced an
immense sense of joy, in what would probably be a
mundane moment to most adults. What were the
children after? What was it that compelled them so?
Was it the conquest? Was it a relationship with the
cricket they sought? Perhaps it was both. Perhaps
they wanted to understand, to bring to focus, a piece
of life that seemed to stand apart from them. In our
urban school, where bugs are strangers and children
dream of spaceships, the children have come to know
a small, elusive cricket.

Class Three has since moved on to kindergarten

leaving Class Two to hold the memory of the year of
the cricket encounter. From time to time, we still hear
the crickets chirping in the atelier and throughout
the school. They have become part of our school
community. Their songs still delight the children,
and always cause a pause and a knowing smile. The

– 16 –
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —

THE CHALLENGE OF
DIVERSITY:
Continuing the Dialogue
By Margie Cooper, Sammie Holloway and Patricia Simpson

Margie Cooper is the president and founder of Inspired Practices in Early Education, Inc. and a North
American Reggio Emilia Alliance board member. Margie has participated in 14 study tours to Reggio
Emilia. Sammie Holloway is a member of the Early Childhood Care and Education faculty at Atlanta
Technical College, and has participated in two study tours to Reggio Emilia. Patricia Simpson is an
adjunct instructor at Griffin Technical College and an independent early childhood technical assistant
advisor and consultant, and has participated in one study tour to Reggio Emilia. Margie, Sammie and
Patricia collaborate together in a professional development project called Project Infinity along with
educators at four Atlanta area programs - Atlanta Technical College ECE Program, Cliff Valley School,
Grant Park Cooperative Preschool and St. Anne's Day School - as well as First Baptist Kindergarten in
Greenville, South Carolina. The following was inspired by the NAREA column in the Fall 2004 issue
of Innovations titled, "The Challenge of Diversity: An Interview with Carol Brunson Day and
Margie Carter."

I freed thousands of slaves.

I could have freed thousands more if they had known they were slaves.
-Harriet Tubman

Introduction Malaguzzi, "The Hundred Languages of Children," has

become a testimony to the obstacles we, as early
So much of what we have discovered from the study
childhood educators and advocates, seek to overcome
of the Reggio approach has revealed that the earliest
- "the school and the culture . . . tell the child to dis-
catalysts for change in Reggio Emilia were born of a
cover the world already there and of the hundred,
decision and a collective drive to question convention-
they steal ninety-nine." Although we seem united in
al thinking. The now well-known poem by Loris

– 17 –
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
our hopes and dreams for children and our future,
why is it that we continue to struggle with questions
of culture, class, race and other headings, used to
speak of our differences? Do we hold different images
of children based on these determinations?
We thank Carol Brunson Day and Margie Carter for
launching a discussion of these issues and offer in this
response, not a response but a continuation of a dis-
cussion. But first, who are we? We are participants in a
small, voluntary, experimental project based in Atlanta,
Georgia. Ours is an ongoing struggle to examine
strategies for raising the quality of programs for chil-
dren in our community, using the study of the Reggio
approach as a tool. January 2005 marked the begin-
ning of our fourth year of work together. We are four
schools in Atlanta and one in Greenville, South
Carolina. We are mostly women. We are all educators.
Some of us are white; some of us are black. Some of
us are older; some of us are younger. Some of us are
natives of Atlanta or Greenville; some of us were born
in other cities, states or countries. In every typical
categorization except occupation, some of us are this
and some of us are that.
Alongside the educators of the five schools, there are
others who play the role of cheerleader and supporter
but work elsewhere-in the public schools, in universi-
ties, in the non-profit sector, in Reggio Emilia, Italy.
The schools in our project are different from one
another. One welcomes children from the wealthiest
families in Atlanta. One welcomes children from the
poorest families in Atlanta. One is a parent coopera-
tive. One is connected to a technical school. One was
founded just 4 years ago, while others have been in
their communities for decades. Two of the schools
participate marginally in our project, while three have
used the project to deeply shape their actions, systems
and styles of working. For each school, each system
within the school, each classroom or each teacher, we
could share both inspiring and demoralizing stories.
Further, there is much that could be described about
the differences between the schools. However, our
guiding choice within our project work is to keep in
front of us, that which unites us. That is, we care
deeply about the children, families and educators in
our community - no matter where they live or where
they go to school. We are also united in our belief that
we can do better in our efforts on behalf of children
and families. And we want to challenge ourselves to
work and learn together.
– 18 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
The gift that time has given our project is the opportu-
nity to build strong professional relationships with one
another. As relationships have grown, so has trust,
which has enabled the group to face questions with
honesty and truth that casual relationships seldom
support. Looking back, several monthly meetings
naturally evolved into forums for our own organic
discussions of race, wealth, expectations and experi-
ences. Like children, we are a naturally curious body of
educators, who now often test our own perceptions
against those of our trusted colleagues in the group.
We have shared our insights with one another and, as
we have shared, our insights have been enriched and
sometimes changed because of the others.
As the three of us writing this article met one long
afternoon to organize our thinking, we adopted the
introductory quote as our challenge and our theme.
What does it mean? We wonder together, are there
patterns of thinking alive today that keep us from the
fruits of our democracy? Do we unthinkingly embrace
unexamined beliefs so naturally, that we have fooled
ourselves about the forces holding us back from our
potential? Finally, we ask, are all children born of
potential or are some less endowed because they are
members of a certain culture, a certain race or a
certain family? And then, what about educators? Do
educators of different backgrounds and cultures hold
different views of children's potential? How can we
build together a community of educators whose
differences are the strength of the group?
Somewhere along the way in our project, we began
to wonder about and learn from one another, the
possible different perspectives we held because of our
race. Sometimes in our project, we have been richly
rewarded by discussions that have naturally emerged
about differing perspectives of parental expectations,
family experiences, images of self and the culturally
constructed image of the child by race. What have we
experienced through this project regarding thinking
about and living in diversity, as it relates to our work
with children, families and each other? For purposes of
this article, we will share three personal reflections.
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
Dimensions of Watching
by Sammie Holloway
On New Years Eve in Afro-American communities,
one is very likely to discover large gatherings of peo-
ple in churches throughout the United States. This
celebration, known as "Watch Night," originated in
the South during the enslavement of the Negro peo-
ple. In the year 1862, President Lincoln signed the
Emancipation Proclamation, legally freeing all slaves
in the Confederate states. On December 31, 1862,
hundreds of men, women and children gathered
for the occasion known as "Freedom's Eve." They
gathered in anticipation of the birth of the promise of
personal sovereignty; they longed to taste the human
right to be loved unashamed and to love; they mar-
veled with shouts of joy for the right to have voice
and choice in the negotiations of their daily affairs;
they danced a jig, trumpeted their songs, cried great
tears for days gone. On bended knees, they offered
enthusiastic prayers of thanksgiving for the opportu-
nity to know unbridled joy, and for the ensuing
opportunities to be and to belong and to become.
The issues of enslavement have not been fully consid-
ered or reconciled within our present democracy by
either the descendents of the enslaved or those that
enslaved. The reality of our country in this present
time is that it has never had a more diverse popula-
tion, yet the scar of earlier mistakes still marks our
efforts to build and act as citizens of one united
nation. One hundred and forty one years since the
signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, the discus-
sion of full acceptance, the accessibility of justice,
the range of rights for all people is yet relegated to
intellectual exercises. In consideration of the issue of
diversity, the daunting question is one of disequilibri-
um. Who are the authors of the current acts of
diversity? Can diversity be administered?
Maybe diversity is a natural result of a surrender of
incubated power, based on an innate consciousness
of basic humanity. Maybe diversity results from the
co-mingling of spirits and of souls, and the positive
engendering of ideas rooted in the personal sover-
eignty of all of life's players. This has been my experi-
ence within our project, which has become known by
us as Project Infinity - never ending. The idea of the
project was to strengthen the evolution of the work
of schools for young children through active and
– 19 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
progressive collaborative work between culturally dif-
ferent school communities. The projected incubation
of the project was four years. The human commit-
ment was based on full participation, observations,
integrity of thought and open-ended actions.
Experiences with Amelia Gambetti, from the Reggio
Emilia schools, were connected to the project as a
launching pad for the development of ideas and
actions with regards to the examination of systems of
cooperative relationships in the schools and between
the schools. Each school director entered the project
with a personal agenda, bias and values, deeply root-
ed in the culture of her origin. I believe that we were
each seeking silently to be found or made better than
the other, each hoping to make obvious our cultural
preeminence. It was a predictable act of western
manufactured diversity.
The idea of the project
was to strengthen the evolution of the
work of schools for young children
through active and progressive
collaborative work between
culturally different school communities. . .
The human commitment
was based on full participation,
observations, integrity of thought
and open-ended actions.
-Sammie Holloway
In the process, though, I experienced a personal
awaking. Over time, I was captured by the game we
were constructing together. I decided not to play by
the old, familiar script any more. I decided that the
stakes were too high. I decided to erupt from my
personal posture of enslavement - the fear of being
rejected for believing that I had the same opportunity
to develop. I internalized the evolution of the work of
the schools in Reggio Emilia. I digested Amelia's
passions regarding struggle as a value rather than an
obstacle, and Margie's unrelenting search to create
approaches for the group to think and act in ways
that challenged our values with respect to children
and the learning community network. I realized that
the scope of our work together was more than a
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
succession of gatherings but instead, presented a
possibility for me to restructure my inner world
through a series of actions, built together with others
who were experiencing with me the devaluing of a
corroded system of inflated woes.
The co-mingling of spirit and souls . . . the engender-
ing of ideals, rooted in personal and collective sover-
eignty . . . the right and responsibility to love freely
and to be loved . . . the right and responsibility to
have voice and choice in negotiating our daily affairs
. . . the right and responsibility to unbridled joy . . .
the right and responsibility to anticipate, to feel . . .
the right and responsibility to express, without fear of
being discovered as strong and sent to the back, in
order to maintain the establishment . . . were realized
little by little at each gathering.
In one of our meetings, Amelia made reference to
documentation as a tool for leaving traces of identity
or giving value to a presence of a people and their
work, and the connection of their work to subsequent
actions. Thinking about her words, I began to
The Rights of All Children
by Patricia Simpson
How does one's cultural background fuel beliefs and
thoughts regarding the rights of children? How does
previous civic training prepare educational relation-
ships? For many in the educational community, recent
research and additional awareness of infants' and
toddlers' growth and development has calmed the
dialogue of nature vs. nurture. Studying the Reggio
approach, however, has initiated other thoughts,
discussions and hopes. Are all children born of power,
competence and potential?
The first year of life and the incredible developmental
strides made by most infants confirm their compe-
tence. Most of these feats are made without instruc-
tions from adults. The adult in the child's life, as well
as the environment surrounding the child, certainly
have a role in providing rich experiences. However,
does the child receive the same respect and privilege
that colleagues might receive for their accomplish-
ments?
– 20 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
question my personal choices of images in my home
as well as in the school. I reflected about unthinkingly
using only images of celebrated black heroes and
unknown portraits in my home. I thought instead
about the value and the ideology of including images
that were reflective of my own personal experience as
well. At school, I began to think of using images of
the children, whose lives filled and had once filled the
school. This seemed so simple, but why had I not
thought about it before?
The value of mutual respect as a tool for advancing a
common goal took root in me and, hopefully, in the
souls of those to whom I am joined. If only for just a
short time every month, the possibility to build
together in an emotionally safe environment is a
moment in time that conjures up, for me, the possi-
bility of many subsequent "eves of freedom." Watch
Night is relevant and remains so for all the same rea-
sons experienced on December 31, 1862. Actualized
diversity in our worlds of work and play places
demands on everyone's interior being.
In many cultures, "a child is to be seen and not
heard." Often children do not have the same privi-
leges as other members of their community. Young
children are not allowed to challenge adult thinking
with questions or to speak out for themselves. Ronald
Lally and colleagues at the WestEd Program for
Infant/Toddler Caregivers provide caregivers a simple
formula for listening to the youngest child, as they
make known their ideas, wishes or desires. If adults
"watch, ask and adapt," the infant can be heard and
understood. Infants expect the adults caring for them
to respond respectfully and accordingly. Adults have a
moral obligation to create environments that respect
and encourage opportunities for infants to question
and draw hypotheses from their daily experiences and
relationships.
In some settings, I wonder whether infants and
toddlers ask themselves, "How can they allow me to
stay in such deplorable conditions? How does this
space permit my voice and my families' voice to be
heard?" Adults have an ethical responsibility to create
living and learning environments for young children
that are, at a basic level, clean, organized and inten-
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —

Adults have an ethical responsibility

to create living and learning environments for young children that are,
at a basic level, clean, organized and intentionally designed
to share and invite civic relationships among
families, children, school and community.
Environments are not determined by finances, but by values.
-Patricia Simpson

tionally designed to share and invite civic relationships
among families, children, school and community.
Environments are not determined by finances, but
by values.
In his book, The Courage to Teach: Exploring the Inner
Landscape of a Teacher's Life, Parker Palmer examines
civic models of community. He looks at the role and
responsibility each member of the community has in
the learning process. If the rights of children are
understood (the head) and believed (the heart), and if
we are convinced that infants are born competent
and that adults must respect infants as a valuable part
of the community, why is it not more evident in class-
room practices (the hand)? Is quality child care only
for the elite in our society? I think not!
As I travel around our state observing in child care
centers and family child care homes, I am appalled at
some of the environments. I encounter drab, unkempt
and cluttered environments where cribs line the entire
classroom more often than not. Conditions that
would not cost more than time and muscle to clean
are widespread. In a society where wealth is perceived
by the amount of material goods one possesses, care-
givers seek more "things" rather than effectively and
efficiently using equipment and materials they may
already have. Many caregivers do not or cannot see
the value in balancing commercial materials with
authentic found materials for children to explore.
Child care providers, families and children who take
pride in their environments share decision-making
and responsibility in creating and maintaining the
environment. I wonder how often technical assistant
advisors and funders encourage child care programs
to take inventory before accumulating additional
materials? Do child care providers start by stripping
and cleaning the environment before replacing toys
and equipment?
Answers to these questions reflect the practice in
many early childhood and educational settings, as
well as the preparation and training of early childhood
teachers. The fundamental beliefs of the infant-toddler
centers and preschools of Reggio Emilia hold high the
principle of civility and the relationship among the
child, the family and the school. After watching a
video clip about the transformation of a school in
Washington, D.C. embracing the Reggio approach,
the promise of the rights of children echoed loud and
clear.
As I watched the Model Early Learning Center video
in the company of the colleagues participating in our
project, I felt an incredible amount of pride. As the
video began and I saw the uncluttered center with
white, almost pristine walls and the ongoing studies
of the area surrounding the nation's capital, I was in
awe. The children and families in this learning com-
munity were predominately African-American. Their
experience is such a contrast to what I frequently wit-
ness in research conducted with low-income African-
American children. All too often, such research is
designed not to show competence, but to highlight
deficiencies.
Do all children have a right to the type of education
inspired by the Reggio approach? I say yes! If more
educators recognized children's competence, believed
in it and built upon it, we could bring so many more
programs to the high quality of care that all children
deserve.

– 21 –
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N
Reflections on
Project Infinity
By Margie Cooper
In my experience with large groups of early childhood
educators, I have found that it is quite rare to observe
working connections between schools from the same
communities. It seems to be very unusual for individ-
ual schools to see themselves as part of any system
beyond their own, yet it is not uncommon for schools
to send educators to sometimes distant professional
development sessions to seek ideas, wisdom and
experience from others. Once gathered, it is often
true that participants begin to share similar struggles
regarding their work.
If school-to-school connections within communities
are rare, connections between schools and other seg-
ments of the community, such as business, political,
academic, cultural or recreational organizations, are
virtually non-existent. Schools, centers and programs
for young children live mostly as islands within a sea
of vibrant community life. Not true at all for the
municipal infant-toddler centers and preschools of
Reggio Emilia, Italy. Why is this? Though I have no
certain answers to that question, I wonder to what
extent beliefs in the wisdom of each person of a
community contribute to their style of working. It
seems that ours is more of a society that believes in
the expert rather than in the wisdom of the common
other.
Yet, in our experience within this project, the vitality
and uniqueness of each person has been a kind of
expertise or fuel for our work. From every person, we
have learned something new, been questioned from
a particular perspective, and given gifts of stories from
the world of children, about which to think. Though
each school stands at a particular intersection in our
community, the dreams we share are united by our
hopes for all children. Using each other to grow
deeper in our knowledge, to gain different experi-
ences and to share in the struggle has been good for
our professional and personal development.
When words begin to take on new and/or deeper
meanings, we feel progress. "Use diversity as a rich-
ness" is written in one of many notebooks dedicated
to my own study of the Reggio approach. Hearing
– 22 –
E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —
Our project, then,
has been simply a choice
to think with others.
In the moments when we have been
presented with a question
or an idea or an analysis that
engages our thoughts,
diversity becomes our necessity.
For it is then that we
need each other's point of view,
style and insight
to grow beyond.
-Margie Cooper
that concept discussed by Reggio educators and living
the truth of it has felt entirely different to me. For
years, it was much easier to fall into thinking that, of
course, they are a different people who can do
different things than we, in the United States. Easier
to think that their way of life was given to them,
rather than constructed intentionally and with
tremendous effort by them. The fruits of this small
project, in which I am one participant, have shown
that using diversity as richness is a point of view, a
decision and a choice. The more we choose it, the
more it becomes a style of thinking and working.
As I reflect back across three years of efforts to come
together in order to think together, I am struck by the
usefulness of thinking. It has been and is the decided
action that contributes most to our development.
Our project, then, has been simply a choice to think
with others. In the moments when we have been
presented with a question or an idea or an analysis
that engages our thoughts, diversity becomes our
necessity. For it is then that we need each other's
point of view, style and insight to grow beyond.
I believe that thinking together produces endorphins.
It resists boredom and it strengthens bonds between
us, all of which seem to create spaces for children that
are filled more with these same characteristics.
 — I N N O V A T I O N S I N E A R L Y E D U C A T I O N —

It is definitely true that we haven't changed any part
of the world beyond the circle of this project in the
years we have been working together. Our group, like
programs, centers and schools throughout North
America, is marginalized from the sweeping education
movements of national, state and local bureaucracies.
However, we now live professional lives that are less
lonely, less despairing and less arbitrary. We know we
matter to each other, that we can rely on each other
and that our work has taken on much deeper
meaning and purpose. Figuring out the daily work of
being an educator in action with children and families
is our constant task. It is still incredibly challenging,
but now the wisdom and experiences of each
person and the group present us with infinite
strategies, ideas and new desires.
We don't have many answers, but we do feel that
we are on to something as it relates to professional
development within the context of whole schools.
This format has given us many opportunities to
examine situations, ways of doing school, values,
assumptions and daily work. Further, the collabora-
tions between the schools have been useful when we
discover together the differences between the schools
on these same points and can ponder together,
"why?"
It would be wrong for us to conclude this discussion
without saying we are still struggling in our project to
grow as colleagues facing public issues. Amelia
Gambetti has shared several times with us, "teaching
is a public act." Criticism and questioning, then, is not
the same as if someone comes into your home, and
analyzes choices and actions. Still, the learning curve
for each of us to grow confidently as resources for
each other, willing to offer to the other a difficult
question, a criticism or an opposite point of view, is
steep. The best we can say is that, in addition to our
willingness to debate children's rights and education,
we also have placed ourselves in a space where
questions of culture, class, race and a myriad of
others can find a voice.

From Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary. G. & C.

Merriam Co. (1976):
Different-partly or totally unlike in nature, form, or
quality.
Diversity-(1) differing from one another. (2) having
various forms or qualities

REFERENCES

Edwards, C., Gandini, L., & Forman, G. (Eds.). 1998.

The hundred languages of children: The Reggio Emilia
approach to early childhood education. Norwood, NJ:
Ablex.

Palmer, P. 1998. The Courage to Teach. San Francisco:

Jossey-Bass Inc.

– 23 –
 EDITORS Brenda Fyfe, Ed.D. Paola Riccò
Webster University Reggio Children International
Editor • Judith Allen Kaminsky Exchanges Executive
Merrill-Palmer Institute, Amelia Gambetti
Wayne State University Coordinator of Reggio Children Lynn White, M.Ed.
and Liaison for Consultancy in Winnetka Public Schools,
Associate Editor • Schools Winnetka, Ill.
Lella Gandini, Ed.D.
Reggio Children Liaison in the Lori Geismar-Ryan, Ph.D.
Clayton Schools’ Family Center, HONORARY EDITORIAL
U.S. for Dissemination of the
Reggio Emilia Approach Clayton, Mo. BOARD MEMBER
Jeanne Goldhaber, Ph.D. Eli Saltz, Ph.D.
University of Vermont Merrill-Palmer Institute,
EDITORIAL BOARD Wayne State University
Susan Lyon, M.A.
Carol Bersani, M.S. The Innovative Teacher Project,
Kent State University San Francisco, Ca.
Sue Bredekamp, Ph.D. John Nimmo, Ed.D.
Council for Professional University of New Hampshire
Recognition
Pam Oken-Wright, M.Ed.
Angela Ferrario, M.Ed. St. Catherine’s School,
Reggio Children Liaison in the Richmond, Va.
U.S. for Study Tours

Please note that unless Innovations prints communications from the office of Reggio Children, the views expressed are those of the individual
contributors representing their own interpretations of the Reggio approach at this point in time. We welcome a diversity of opinions and do
not attempt to present these voices as the voice of Reggio.

Drawings created by the four and five year old children from Ernesto Balducci School in Reggio Emilia, Italy, courtesy of Reggio Children.
Drawings created by the children of Evergreen Community School in Santa Monica, Ca. and photographs of Evergreen children and teachers,
courtesy of Patricia Hunter McGrath and Alise Shafer.

Wayne State University is an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer.

WAY N E STATE NON-PROFIT

U.S. POSTAGE
U N IVE RS ITY PAID
The Merrill-Palmer Institute Detroit, Mich.
71 E. Ferry Ave. Permit No. 3844
Detroit, MI 48202
313/872-1790
www.mpi.wayne.edu

Innovations
in early education: the international reggio exchange