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Supporting Children’s Creativity through Music, Dance, Drama and Art: Creative conversations in the Early Years
There is a growing awareness in Early Years education that an essential part of children’s development involves creative engagement through language, gestures, body movements, drawing and music; creating shared meanings in playful contexts. Supporting Children’s Creativity through Music, Dance, Drama and Art brings together contributions from a range of professionals and early years practitioners, to help readers implement the themes of the Early Years Foundation Stage framework in a creative way. Emphasising the need for responsive adults and a creative atmosphere for learning, this book
152 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2010
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September 28, 2016
Pedagogy of listening in action and reflection
Edit of the previous review
After reading this book in more depth, and using it as a basis for the practical application of my studies for few days, I feel I have to give it justice. It is not just a book for professional with great examples of childcare approaches. This book is a masterpiece of child observation and of pedagogy of listening applied to real setting and brought back to reflective discourse. Highly recommended to anybody who wants to understand children and childcare better, and build deeper interactions based on the respect of the child's voice, parents included. Precious for childcarers and teachers (primary school teachers, too!). It may require some previous acquaintance with development theories and childcare studies. Or maybe not, I am not sure.
Diverse voices of professionals, meeting at 'Dinner Dialogues' and constantly reflecting together on their own practices and on theory in the field, give life to this 'Book-in-Process', so much such that it makes you feel empowered to write the next chapter with your on contribution on the field, your errors and your (and children's) insights.
Each different chapter is a case study on the complexities related to building meaningful creative conversations with children in the early years, based on practice, and millions of light-years far from both the detached, clinical observation-assessment process of the observations as taught at certain levels of childcare studies, and from the hyerarchical, standardised, uniform approach to children of schools in nearly all the world. It is not by chance that inspiration for many of the interventions in the collection stems from visits in Reggio Emilia, cradle of the pedagogy of listening.
A look at the index of the interventions themselves will provide an idea of the deep interconnection between the interventions themselves towards an organic narrative. The thematic groups are:
Making time and space: reflections on setting environments, on listening, on observing.
Story making: narratives about the use of narrative, may it be photographic, story telling or a Talking Table.
Music making: or how music can become a real mean of expression and reflection-in-action for children, through its liaisons with movement and voice.
The last two contributions focus on shared reflections between Fleurs Griffiths and the contributor Rose Davies, and go back to Conversations and the Creative Self: Making Sense of Research, so linking the discourse to its academic roots.
The index talks of a choral yet organic structure. In the different chapters, the authors converse with the compiler and between themelves, reflecting critically and passionately about their own practices, and the children's voice is present everywhere through continuous reference to the real experiences in childcare settings. No formal academic papers, yet much scientific reliability (just look at the comparatively short and very well conceived bibliography).
Masterpiece, masterpiece.
Previous review
Please note: if you are looking for a "fun activities" book you are going to be disappointed, and at a dear price. This is a text for professionals, or for people interested to developments in childcare.
It is one of my college text books, and I have just skimmed it today. Having worked in the field for some time, I can say, for now, that it looks like a great survey of effective examples of contemporary approaches to practical childcare, all children-centred and based on state-of-the-art research.
Edit of the previous review
After reading this book in more depth, and using it as a basis for the practical application of my studies for few days, I feel I have to give it justice. It is not just a book for professional with great examples of childcare approaches. This book is a masterpiece of child observation and of pedagogy of listening applied to real setting and brought back to reflective discourse. Highly recommended to anybody who wants to understand children and childcare better, and build deeper interactions based on the respect of the child's voice, parents included. Precious for childcarers and teachers (primary school teachers, too!). It may require some previous acquaintance with development theories and childcare studies. Or maybe not, I am not sure.
Diverse voices of professionals, meeting at 'Dinner Dialogues' and constantly reflecting together on their own practices and on theory in the field, give life to this 'Book-in-Process', so much such that it makes you feel empowered to write the next chapter with your on contribution on the field, your errors and your (and children's) insights.
Each different chapter is a case study on the complexities related to building meaningful creative conversations with children in the early years, based on practice, and millions of light-years far from both the detached, clinical observation-assessment process of the observations as taught at certain levels of childcare studies, and from the hyerarchical, standardised, uniform approach to children of schools in nearly all the world. It is not by chance that inspiration for many of the interventions in the collection stems from visits in Reggio Emilia, cradle of the pedagogy of listening.
A look at the index of the interventions themselves will provide an idea of the deep interconnection between the interventions themselves towards an organic narrative. The thematic groups are:
Making time and space: reflections on setting environments, on listening, on observing.
Story making: narratives about the use of narrative, may it be photographic, story telling or a Talking Table.
Music making: or how music can become a real mean of expression and reflection-in-action for children, through its liaisons with movement and voice.
The last two contributions focus on shared reflections between Fleurs Griffiths and the contributor Rose Davies, and go back to Conversations and the Creative Self: Making Sense of Research, so linking the discourse to its academic roots.
The index talks of a choral yet organic structure. In the different chapters, the authors converse with the compiler and between themelves, reflecting critically and passionately about their own practices, and the children's voice is present everywhere through continuous reference to the real experiences in childcare settings. No formal academic papers, yet much scientific reliability (just look at the comparatively short and very well conceived bibliography).
Masterpiece, masterpiece.
Previous review
Please note: if you are looking for a "fun activities" book you are going to be disappointed, and at a dear price. This is a text for professionals, or for people interested to developments in childcare.
It is one of my college text books, and I have just skimmed it today. Having worked in the field for some time, I can say, for now, that it looks like a great survey of effective examples of contemporary approaches to practical childcare, all children-centred and based on state-of-the-art research.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review