Loris Malaguzzi and the Reggio Emilia experience: keynote address, OMEP Ireland Conference, April 2009

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Date
2011-04
Authors
Cunneen, Maura
Ridgway, Anna
Murphy, Rosaleen
Hall, Kathy
Cunningham, Denice
Horgan, Mary
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Abstract
The keynote address at the 2009 OMEP Ireland research conference was given by a team from the School of Education, University College Cork, who had just completed work on a co-authored book entitled Loris Malaguzzi and the Reggio Emilia Experience for the Continuum Library of Educational Thought. This paper presents some of the highlights from that presentation; the book explores these issues in much greater detail and also discusses the thorny issue of curriculum in Reggio Emilia. The Reggio Emilia early years educators strongly resist the idea of describing what they do as a curriculum, preferring instead the word ‘experience’. If we define ‘curriculum’ in the narrow sense of a set of prescribed learning goals and experiences, (rather than all the people, things, experiences and emotions that the child encounters in the pre-school) then this is undoubtedly the wrong word to describe what they do. Nevertheless, their practice is not by any means atheoretical, and the Reggio Emilia educators continually reflect on and refine their practice. The historical background of “Reggio” as well as the various strands of curriculum theory that underpin thinking on how best to foster children’s early learning and development are both necessary if we are to see it in context and to make an informed judgement on why Newsweek in 1991 described them as “the best pre-schools in the world”.
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Reggio Emilia , Malaguzzi , Italy , Early childhood education , Parental involvement , Preschool , Curriculum
Citation
Cunneen, M., Ridgway, A., Murphy, R., Hall, K., Cunningham, D. and Horgan, M. (2011) ‘Loris Malaguzzi and the Reggio Emilia experience: keynote address, OMEP Ireland Conference, April 2009’, (Proceedings of OMEP Ireland Annual Research Conference 2009: In Defence of Childhood, University College Cork, 27-29 March 2009) An Leanbh Óg: The OMEP Ireland Journal of Early Childhood Studies, Vols. 4 and 5, June 2011.
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© 2011, the Authors and OMEP Ireland. All rights reserved; no part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher.