Theories on early year curriculums

Only by listening to the questions (verbal and non-verbal) children ask we will be able to develop the perfect curriculum.”

Griffiths R. (1935). 

This report has been set out to demonstrate a range of theories and their philosophy on four different curricular approaches, being; Reggio Emilia, Montessori, Steiner and Forest schools. As every child is unique, there are a number of factors that influence a child’s learning. This report will discuss how these approaches have influenced current best practice, meeting every child’s needs by having an effect on the curricular guidance in the UK. It will also make recommendations for development in the setting I work in, enabling effective learning and positive interaction, focusing on issues relating to inclusion and anti-discriminatory practice in order to provide them with equal opportunities that will create holistic development.

As development occurs rapidly during the early years, every stage of development should control the learning they are offered, meeting each child’s needs. Early year’s settings should focus on promoting care and learning opportunities for young children making it stimulating and rewarding. All the four approaches have taken into account that children’s brains thrive on stimulation and new experiences, and play can extend children’s development and learning. The findings of the EPPE project also suggest; that it is not enough to create a stimulating environment and simply let children play, as children learn best when staff actively teach them. This means modelling appropriate language and behaviour, sharing intelligent conversations, asking open-ended questions and using play to motivate and encourage them.

The early year’s curriculum is based on key theories of how children learn and current early years practice has grown out of the work of early years educators. By incorporating their ideas into forming the curriculum, early year’s settings encourage learning through first-hand experience. We will look into the four approaches and see how they have been embedded into the Early Years Foundation Stage by setting the standards for learning, development and care for children from birth to five.

Loris Malaguzzi (1920-1994) was the educational thinker who guided and inspired the ‘Reggio Emilia’ approach in the Reggio Romagna region of Northern Italy. The approach requires children to be seen as competent, resourceful, curious, imaginative, inventive, and possess a desire to interact and communicate with others. Dr Loris Malaguzzi helped us understand that children shouldn’t be expected to all have the same ways of expressing themselves, so he put forth the idea that there are 100 languages or ways of learning (paint, clay, music, drama, cooking, etc) in which expression and learning can take place.

The Reggio Emilia approach to early childhood education has been adopted in USA, UK, New Zealand, Australia and many other countries. The Reggio Emilia method is made possible through a carefully articulated and collaborative approach to the care and education of young children and has also influenced Te Wariki in New Zealand. Reggio is a way of thinking about how young children learn and is based on the philosophies of Dewey and Vygotsky that is a very large idea with many parts, not a curriculum that can be adopted and implemented. Malguzzi used this versatility of research and theory recognising the contributions to Reggio’s thinking by the great educators; Vygotsky, Piaget and Jerome Bruner and this concept is brought about in the Early Years Foundation Stage-Every Child Matters Framework. As stated by Bruner, (1995) “We are researching children researching their world.”

Some of the key principles of Reggio are: