Phase 1

Principles and Approaches to teaching Young Learners

Principles and approaches to teaching young learners relate teaching to learning. Teaching
facilitates learning by promoting and nurturing a culture of learning, building connections
between knowledge. Teaching should facilitate the construction of meaning, promote
understanding and connect theory and practice.
Learning is commonly defined as a process that brings together cognitive, emotional, and
environmental influences and experiences for acquiring, enhancing, or making changes in
one's knowledge, skills, values, and world views (Illeris, 2000; Ormorod, 1995). Learning as a
process focuses on what happens when the learning takes place. Explanations of what
happens constitute learning theories. A learning theory is an attempt to describe how people
and animals learn, thereby helping us understand the inherently complex process
of learning. Learning theories have two chief values according to Hill (2002). One is in
providing us with vocabulary and a conceptual framework for interpreting the examples of
learning that we observe. The other is in suggesting where to look for solutions to practical
problems. The theories do not give us solutions, but they do direct our attention to those
variables that are crucial in finding solutions.
We begin with the Montessori approach to teaching:
Maria Montessori (picture to the left) was, in many ways,
ahead of her time. Born in the town of Chiaravalle, in the
province of Ancona, Italy, in 1870, she became the first
female physician in Italy upon her graduation from medical
school in 1896. In her medical practice, her clinical
observations led her to analyze how children learn, and she
concluded that they build themselves from what they find
in their environment. What ultimately became the Montessori method of education developed
there, based upon Montessori's scientific observations of these children's almost effortless
ability to absorb knowledge from their surroundings, as well as their tireless interest in
manipulating materials. Every piece of equipment, every exercise, every method Montessori

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developed was based on what she observed children to do "naturally," by themselves,

unassisted by adults.
Children teach themselves. This simple but profound truth inspired Montessori's lifelong
pursuit of educational reform, methodology, psychology, teaching, and teacher trainingall
based on her dedication to furthering the self-creating process of the child.
Maria Montessori died in

Noordwijk, Holland, in 1952, but her work lives on through

the Association Montessori Internationale (AMI), the organization she founded in Amsterdam,
Netherlands, in 1929 to carry on her work.
PRINCIPLES OF MONTESSORI METHOD
The Montessori method is based on several principles. Montessori believed that learning is a
natural, self-directed process that follows several fundamental laws of human nature
.According to Montessori principles, a child will naturally become in harmony with his or her
environment during the learning process as long as the environment is properly prepared and
maintained. The role of the adult in the childs learning process is to simply prepare the
environment and to make sure this environment remains intact . Montessoris principles state
that the adult who is preparing the environment needs to be committed to several things:
observation, individual liberty, and sufficient preparation. Montessori believes that as long as
the adults involved in the learning process follow these guidelines the children will engage
themselves in their own learning process .
The teaching methods used in the Montessori
classroom (picture to the left) are very specific.
The Montessori teacher must be sure to include
work tasks and activities that involve all of the
individual

intelligences.

include

musical,

These

intelligences

kinesthetic,

spatial,

interpersonal, intrapersonal, intuitive, linguistic,

and logical. Children are given the opportunity to
explore different activities that address these
different areas of knowledge .
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A Montessori class usually consists of 30 to 35 students and one to two teachers. Children are
grouped in three-year spans, which allow the children to remain with the same teacher for
three to six years. The classroom is usually divided into center stations. The center stations
are grouped by category such as daily living materials (washing station, cleaning supplies,
etc.), sensorial materials (sand, sound cylinders, etc.), academic materials (books, pencils,
etc.), and cultural/artistic materials (paints, crayons, markers, etc.). The materials found in
each station are carefully organized and usually remain in the same location throughout the
entire school year.
The materials used in the classroom are also an important aspect of the Montessori school
system. The materials used are specific to the Montessori school and each serve a very
specific purpose. When new material is introduced into the classroom the teacher carefully
demonstrates to the children exactly how the material should be used.

After this

demonstration the children are expected to only use the material the way it is supposed to be
used. If the teacher sees the child using the material in a different way he or she will
demonstrate the proper use of the material once again. An example of such a material is the
dried pea work task. The child is given a bowl of dried peas along with a spoon and an empty
bowl. The teacher demonstrates to the child how to spoon the dried peas into the empty
bowl. The child is then left to complete this task on his or her own. If the teacher were to
see the child using the peas for any other play or work he or she would demonstrate the task
again.
Montessori claims that their school system, unlike traditional school systems, provides
children with the opportunity to grow into independent and self-sufficient individuals with a
deeply rooted love for learning.
How her Basic Principles came about :
Montessori kept a list on what children like:
Children like to repeat exercises; once they discover certain activities they want to
repeat them constantly in order to master them (sensitive period).
Children like to choose on their own.
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Children have the need to check on themselves.

It is a challenge to them to come up with the right solution.
Children like it when human movements are analyzed. How do you do a specific
movement? Is it a beautiful movement?
Children enjoy silence exercises.
Children favor good manners in their social behavior.
Children like an ordered environment in which everything has a fixed place.
This gives them a sense of security and safety.
Children feel a need to take care of their own body, for instance, washing, blowing their
nose.
Children in the ages from three to six are geared toward their senses; through their
senses they learn to explore and order their environment.
Children write before they start reading (no books yet).

Geometric Solids
Magic Box

Sound Boxes

Colour Tablets

Montessori Equipment Images

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Play is a natural instinct of the children. It has been effectively used for teaching. Friedrich
Wilhelm August Froebel (picture to the left) was the father of the
Kindergarten system, "Children's Garden" a system which encourages fun
and play based learning. Froebel characterized play as the "work" of
childhood and described it as "the purest, the most spiritual, product of
man at this stage."
Froebel sought to encourage the creation of educational environment that involved practical
work and the direct use of materials. Through engaging with the world, understanding
unfolds. Hence the significance of play. It is both a creative activity and through it children
become aware of their place in the world. He went on to develop special materials (such as
shaped wooden bricks and balls - gifts), a series of recommended activities (occupations) and
movement activities, and linking set of theories. His original concern was the teaching of
young children through educational games in the family. In the later years of his life this
became linked with a demand for the provision of special centres for the care and
development of children outside the home.
We have seen the development of kindergartens, and the emergence of a Froebel movement.
For informal educators, Friedrich Froebel's continuing relevance has lain in his concern
for learning through activity, his interest in social learning and his emphasis on the
'unification 'of life.
Froebel labeled his approach to education as "self-activity". This idea allows the child to be
led by his or her own interests and to freely explore them. The teacher's role, therefore, was
to be a guide rather than lecturer.
Froebel's kindergarten was designed to meet each child's need for:

physical activity

the development of sensory awareness and physical dexterity

creative expression

exploration of ideas and concepts

the pleasure of singing

the experience of living among others

satisfaction of the soul

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The Kindergarten Curriculum

Froebel developed a series of gifts and occupations for use in kindergartens. Representing
what Froebel identified as fundamental forms, the gifts had both their actual physical
appearance and also a hidden symbolic meaning. They were to stimulate the child to bring
the fundamental concept that they represented to mental consciousness. Froebel's gifts were
the following items.

Six soft, colored balls

A wooden sphere, cube, and cylinder

A large cube divided into eight smaller cubes

A large cube divided into eight oblong blocks

A large cube divided into twenty-one whole,

six half, and twelve quarter cubes

A large cube divided into eighteen whole

oblongs:

three

divided lengthwise

three

divided breadth wise

Froebels gifts

Quadrangular and triangular tablets used for arranging figures

Sticks for outlining figures Whole and half wire rings for outlining figures

Various materials for drawing, perforating, embroidering, paper

cutting, weaving or braiding, paper folding, modeling, and interlacing

The occupations were items such as paper, pencils, wood, sand, clay, straw, and sticks for
use in constructive activities. Kindergarten activities included games, songs, and stories
designed to assist in sensory and physical development and socialization. By playing, children
socialize and imitate adult social and economic activities as they
are gradually led into the larger world of group life. The
kindergarten provided a milieu that encouraged children to interact
with other children under the guidance of a loving teacher, and this
is followed in KG schools all over the world even today.
Swiss biologist and psychologist Jean Piaget (1896-1980) is
renowned for constructing a highly influential model of child
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development and learning.

Piaget discovered that children think and reason differently at

different periods in their lives. He believed that everyone passed through an invariant
sequence of four qualitatively distinct stages.
Invariant means that a person cannot skip stages or reorder them. Although every normal
child passes through the stages in exactly the same order, there is some variability in the ages
at

which

children

attain

each

stage.

Piaget identified four major stages: sensori-motor, preoperational, concrete operational

and formal operational. Piaget believed all children pass through these phases to advance to
the next level of cognitive development.

Sensorimotor stage: from birth to age 2. Children experience the world through
movement and senses (use five senses to explore the world). During the sensorimotor
stage children are extremely egocentric, meaning they cannot perceive the world from
others' viewpoints. The sensori-motor stage is divided into six sub-stages: "(1) simple
reflexes; (2) first habits and primary circular reactions; (3) secondary circular
reactions; (4) coordination of secondary circular reactions; (5) tertiary circular
reactions, novelty, and curiosity; and (6) internalization of schemes."

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Simple reflexes is from birth to 1 month old. At this time infants use reflexes such as
rooting and sucking.

First habits and primary circular reactions are from 1 month to 4 months old. During
this time infants learn to coordinate sensation and two types of scheme (habit and
circular reactions). A primary circular reaction is when the infant tries to reproduce an
event that happened by accident (ex: sucking thumb).

The third stage, secondary circular reactions, occurs when the infant is 4 to 8 months
old. At this time they become aware of things beyond their own body; they are more
object oriented. At this time they might accidentally shake a rattle and continue to do
it for sake of satisfaction.

Coordination of secondary circular reactions is from 8 months to 12 months old. During

this stage they can do things intentionally. They can now combine and recombine
schemes and try to reach a goal (ex: use a stick to reach something). They also
understand object permanence during this stage. That is, they understand that objects
continue to exist even when they can't see them.

The fifth stage occurs from 12 months old to 18 months old. During this stage infants
explore new possibilities of objects; they try different things to get different results.

+The preoperational stage usually occurs during the period between toddlerhood (1824months) and early childhood (7 years). During this stage children begin to use language;
memory and imagination also develop. In the preoperational stage, children engage in make
believe and can understand and express relationships between the past and the future. More
complex concepts, such as cause and effect relationships, have not been learned. Intelligence
is egocentric and intuitive, not logical.
The concrete operational stage typically develops between the ages of 7-11 years.
Intellectual development in this stage is demonstrated through the use of logical and
systematic manipulation of symbols, which are related to concrete objects. Thinking becomes
less egocentric with increased awareness of external events, and involves concrete
references.
The period from adolescence through adulthood is the formal operational stage. Adolescents
and adults use symbols related to abstract concepts. Adolescents can think about multiple

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variables in systematic ways, can formulate hypotheses, and think about abstract
relationships and concepts.
Piaget's Key Ideas (SUMMARY)
Adaptation

What it says: adapting to the world through assimilation and accommodation

Assimilation

The process by which a person takes material into their mind from the environment,
which may mean changing the evidence of their senses to make it fit.

Accommodation The difference made to one's mind or concepts by the process of assimilation.
Note that assimilation and accommodation go together: you can't have one without
the other.
Classification

The ability to group objects together on the basis of common features.

Class Inclusion

The understanding, more advanced than simple classification, that some classes
or sets of objects are also sub-sets of a larger class. (E.g. there is a class of objects
called dogs. There is also a class called animals. But all dogs are
also animals, so the class of animals includes that of dogs)

Conservation

The realisation that objects or sets of objects stay the same even when they are
changed about or made to look different.

Decantation

The ability to move away from one system of classification to another one as
appropriate.

Egocentrism

The belief that you are the centre of the universe and everything revolves around
you: the corresponding inability to see the world as someone else does and adapt to
it. Not moral "selfishness", just an early stage of psychological development.

Operation

The process of working something out in your head. Young children (in the sensor
motor and pre-operational stages) have to act, and try things out in the real world,
to work things out (like count on fingers): older children and adults can do more in
their heads.

Schema(or
scheme)

The representation in the mind of a set of perceptions, ideas, and/or actions, which
go together.

Stage

A period in a child's development in which he or she is capable of understanding

some things but not others

Stages of Cognitive Development

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Stage

Characterised by

Sensori-motor
(Birth-2 yrs)

Differentiates self from objects

Recognises self as agent of action and begins to act intentionally: e.g. pulls a string
to set mobile in motion or shakes a rattle to make a noise

Pre-operational
(2-7 years)

Concrete
operational
(7-11 years)

Achieves object permanence: realises that things continue to exist even when no
longer present to the sense (pace Bishop Berkeley)
Learns to use language and to represent objects by images and words Thinking is
still egocentric: has difficulty taking the viewpoint of others .

Classifies objects by a single feature: e.g. groups together all the red blocks
regardless of shape or all the square blocks regardless of colour
Can think logically about objects and events
Achieves conservation of number (age 6), mass (age 7), and weight (age 9)
Classifies objects according to several features and can order them in series along a
single dimension such as size.

Formal
Can think logically about abstract propositions and test hypotheses systematically
operational
(11 years and up) Becomes concerned with the hypothetical, the future, and ideological problems

THE REGGIO EMILIA APPROACH

The Reggio Emilia approach is a form of alternative education which focuses on teaching
children through a strong sense of community. It is usually applied to young students in preschool and primary school grades. This philosophy proposes interactive methods of teaching,
which often involve the parents, educators and environment in a variety of ways.
Loris Malaguzzi (1920-1994) founded the 'Reggio Emilia'
approach at a city in northern Italy called Reggio Emilia.
The 'Reggio' approach was developed for municipal
child-care and education programs serving children
below six. The approach requires children to be seen as
competent, resourceful, curious, imaginative, inventive
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and possess a desire to interact and communicate with others.

The 'Reggio' vision of the child as a competent learner has produced a strong child-directed
curriculum model. The curriculum has purposive progression but not scope and sequence.
Teachers follow the children's interests and do not provide focused instruction in reading and
writing. Reggio approach has a strong belief that children learn through interaction with
others, including parents, staff and peers in a friendly learning environment.
The Reggio Emilia approach was conceived, encompass and implement the theoretical
contributions of thinkers including Dewey, Piaget, Vygotsky and Bruner. Collaboration among
children, teachers, parents, and the community is highly valued and the centers are open to
all families regardless of income and supported by the town.
This approach originated in the Italian city of Reggio Emilia after World War II. At that time,
some of the schools in the city rejected the traditional approach of teaching children through
strict discipline and guidelines, and adopted a more flexible method. Gradually, this new way
gained popularity around the world because it encourages child development through
exploration of interests and building relationships with others.
One of the key elements of the Reggio Emilia
approach is the school environment. Small
and colorless classrooms are thought to be
unproductive

and

limiting

to

childs

imagination. This philosophy suggests lessons

be held in much bigger rooms with plenty of
light, space and real plants. The idea behind
the principle is to stimulate a students sense
of exploration from an early stage. Some schools following the Reggio Emilia approach try to
limit the barriers between classrooms to encourage interaction between students.
Parents and friends are very important to this alternative form of education. The childrens
development is often seen as the responsibility of the entire community. Parents are strongly
encouraged to assist their children, not only with homework, but also by being involved in the

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child's school activities. The Reggio Emilia approach places a great value on parental input,
and most school boards hold open meetings on issues like school curriculum and policy.
A major innovation brought about by this type of philosophy is the role of educators. Learning
material is typically designed to enhance the teachers own education, to allow them to learn
along with their students. Many of these teaching methods include learning from physical
experience, such as touching, hearing or seeing. Examinations, such as achievement tests, are
often limited and a greater focus is put on helping the children to comprehend the practical
ways they can use what they are learning.
Another important aspect of the Reggio Emilia approach is that it gives children some control
over the way they learn things. Parents and teachers are often instructed to find ways to
incorporate individual student interests into a child's learning process. Children are also
motivated to express themselves through various means, such as writing, drawing and playacting. These works are often shared, and even revised, by their peers, to encourage
collective participation.
This model was conceived after World War II when the women of Reggio wanted to build a
school, literally from the rubble of the devastated town. The curriculum is based on close
observation and documentation of the childrens ideas by the teacher who co-constructs
knowledge with the children. Their ideology expanded and deepened and special roles are
given to the atelierista (helps children express ideas) and the pedagogista (the teacher and
connector of teachers). Parents continue to be engaged as partners in their childs learning.
The environment is used as a valuable source of learning both to inspire, reflect, and to
promote the work of the children, which is done in small groups.
Here are some key features of Reggio Emilia's early childhood program:
The role of the environment-as-teacher

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Within the Reggio Emilia schools, the educators are very concerned about what their
school environment teach children. Hence, a great attention is given to the look and
feel of the classroom. It is often referring to the environment as the "third teacher".

The aesthetic beauty within the schools is seen as an important part of respecting the
child and their learning environment.

A classroom atmosphere of playfulness and joy pervades.

Teachers organize environment rich in possibilities and provocations that invite the
children to undertake extended exploration and problem solving, often in small
groups, where cooperation and disputation mingle pleasurably.

Documentation of children's work, plants, and collections that children have made
from former outings are displayed both at the children's and adult eye level.

Common space available to all children in the school includes dramatic play areas and
work tables for children from different classrooms to come together.

Children's multiple symbolic languages

Using the arts as a symbolic language through which to express their understandings in
their project work

Consistent with Dr. Howard Gardner's notion of schooling for multiple intelligences,
the Reggio approach calls for the integration of the graphic arts as tools for cognitive,
linguistic, and social development.

Presentation of concepts and hypotheses in multiple forms such as print, art,

construction, drama, music, puppetry, and shadow play. These are viewed as essential
to children's understanding of experience.

Documentation

as

assessment

and

advocacy

(Rather unique in Reggio approach)

Documenting and displaying the children's project work, which is necessary for
children to express, revisit, and construct and reconstruct their feelings, ideas and
understandings.

Similar to the portfolio approach, documentation of children's work in progress is

viewed as an important tool in the learning process for children, teachers, and
parents.

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Pictures of children engaged in experiences, their words as they discuss what they are
doing, feeling and thinking, and the children's interpretation of experience through
the visual media are displayed as a graphic presentation of the dynamics of learning.

Teachers act as recorders (documenters) for the children, helping them trace and
revisit their words and actions and thereby making the learning visible.

Long-term projects

Supporting and enriching children's learning through in-depth, short-term (one week)
and long-term (throughout the school year) project work, in which responding,
recording, playing, exploring, hypothesis building and testing, and provoking occurs.

Projects are child-centered, following their interest, returning again and again to add
new insights.

Throughout a project, teachers help children make decisions about the direction of
study, the ways in which the group will research the topic, the representational
medium that will demonstrate and showcase the topic.

The teacher as researcher

The teacher's role within the Reggio Emilia approach is complex. Working as coteachers, the role of the teacher is first and foremost to be that of a learner alongside
the children. The teacher is a teacher-researcher, a resource and guide as she/he
lends expertise to children.

Within such a teacher-researcher role, educators carefully listen, observe, and

document children's work and the growth of community in their classroom and are to
provoke and stimulate thinking

Teachers are committed to reflection about their own teaching and learning.

Classroom teachers working in pairs and collaboration, sharing information and

mentoring between personnel.

Home-school relationships

Children, teachers, parents and community are interactive and work together.
Building a community of inquiry between adults and children.

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For communication and interaction can deepen children's inquiry and theory building
about the world around them

Programs in Reggio are family centered. Loris's vision of an "education based on

relationships" focuses on each child in relation to others and seeks to activate and
support children's reciprocal relationships with other children, family, teachers,
society, and the environment.

Reggio approach is not a formal model with defined methods (such as Waldorf and
Montessori), teacher certification standards and accreditation processes. But rather, the
educators in Reggio Emilia speak of their evolving "experience" and see themselves as a
provocation and reference point, a way of engaging in dialogue starting from a strong and rich
vision of the child. In all of these settings, documentation was explored as a means of
promoting parent and teacher understanding of children's learning and development.
The Reggio Emilia approach on early childhood education, it did not play down on the other
approaches such as Waldorf and Montessori. Each approach has its own strengths and
weaknesses as well as areas of difference.
The Pre-primary Schools of Reggio Emilia
In contrast, the educators in the preprimary schools of Reggio Emilia are very concerned
about what their school environments teach children, often referring to the environment as
the "third educator" in conjunction with the two classroom teachers (Gandini, 1998, p. 177).
The environment reflects the schools' grounding in John Dewey's educational philosophy and
Vygotsky's social constructivist learning theory (Malaguzzi, 1998). It embodies Reggio
educators' belief that children are resourceful, curious, competent, imaginative, and have a
desire to interact with and communicate with others (Rinaldi, 1998, p. 114). They believe
that children can best create meaning and make sense of their world through living in
complex, rich environments which support "complex, varied, sustained, and changing
relationships between people, the world of experience, ideas and the many ways of
expressing ideas" (Cadwell, p. 93) rather than from simplified lessons or learning
environments. They also believe that children have a right to environments which support the
development of their many languages (Reggio Children, 1996).

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There is great concern for what the environment is teaching. The design of the schools
reflects the structure of the community. The schools reflect a diversity of ages and
architectural styles yet each school is designed around a piazza which reflects the central
piazzas of the city. These are not solely vehicles for moving through to get someplace else
but serve as gathering places for children from all the classes and comfortable meeting spaces
for parents and teachers. Entering the Diana School, a visitor looks down the piazza where
floor to ceiling windows and plants blur the boundaries between outside and in, supporting
the concepts of transparency and osmosis. Lights and shadows reflect and flicker across the
floor. The piazza offers many possibilities: a store, stocked with real vegetables a
kaleidoscope large enough to hold several children; and fanciful dress-up clothes all invite
investigation, lingering, conversation and collaboration.
Reggio educators include aspects of a home into the school: vases of flowers, real dishes,
tablecloths, and plants. There is attention to design and placement of objects to provide a
visual and meaningful context. The objects within the space are not simplified, cartoon like
images that are assumed to appeal to children, but are "beautiful" objects in their own right.
For example, dried flowers hang from the ceiling beams and attractive jars of beans and
seeds are displayed on shelves in the dinning area of Arcobaleno Infant-Toddler Center. On
the 1997 study tour to Reggio, I was struck by the beautiful wooden table with a large bowl of
flowers and wooden sideboard in one of the rooms in La Villetta School. I imagined being in a
fine Italian dining room! Manufactured and natural materials available for art projects are
carefully displayed in transparent containers, or objects are set on or before mirrors to
provide multiple views and capture children's attention. The strong role of the arts in Italian
culture is clearly evident in the place of the atelier (art studio), mini ateliers adjacent to
each classroom and the role the atelierista (artist-teacher) plays in supporting children and
teachers in their work
The walls hold the history of the life within the school in the form of documentation panels of
children's words and photos which synthesize past projects and chronicle current ones.
Children's work and words are highly visible within the space communicating clearly to the
children, their parents, and the community respect and value for children's abilities and
potential, creating another form of transparency and osmosis between the school and
surrounding community.
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According to John Dewey Education is life itself.

John Dewey (1859-1952) believed that learning was active and
schooling unnecessarily long and restrictive. His idea was that
children came to school to do things and live in a community which
gave them real, guided experiences which fostered their capacity to
contribute to society. For example, Dewey believed that students
should be involved in real-life tasks and challenges.

math could be learnt via learning proportions in cooking or figuring out how long it
would take to get from one place to another by mule

history could be learnt by experiencing how people lived, geography, what the climate
was like, and how plants and animals grew, were important subjects

Dewey had a gift for suggesting activities that captured the center of what his classes were
studying.
Dewey's education philosophy helped forward the "progressive education" movement, and
spawned the development of "experiential education" programs and experiments.
THE THEMATIC APPROACH (INTEGRATED CURRICULUM)
Thematic teaching is about students actively constructing their own knowledge. Theorists
Piaget and Vygotsky were strong proponents of this constructivist approach. Piaget (1926)
believed that knowledge is built in a slow, continuous construction of skills and undestanding
that each child brings to each situation as he or she matures. He also emphasized the
cognitive growth that takes place when students cooperate and interact with one another.
Vygotsky (1997, 175) suggested that social interaction and collaboration were powerful
sources of transformation in the child's thinking: "In education it is far more important to
teach the child how to think than to communicate various bits of knowledge to him."
Therefore, thematic teaching can be defined as the process of integrating and linking
multiple elements of a curriculum in an ongoing exploration of many different aspects of a
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topic or subject. It involves a constant interaction between teacher and students and their
classroom environment. Among the important elements that foster success in any thematic
project are initiation of the theme, the teacher's role, group exploration, integration of the
theme with the curriculum and learning centers, and building and maintaining spirit and
enthusiasm.
Various Web sites also can aid in the initiation of a theme. For younger students, visit the
Web site of Jan Brett, author of Gingerbread Baby (1999) as well as many other children's
books (www.janbrett.com). Older students can research their interest in particular aspects of
a theme via the library and the Internet.
Thematic Teaching and Curriculum Integration are established with the following
goals in mind:

INSTRUCTION. . . is planned to accommodate individual interests, abilities, and rates of

learning while fostering a climate of teamwork and mutual support. Students are
grouped into heterogeneous, mixed-age classes that are taught by a two-teacher team.
Students stay with these teachers for two years. They work in groups of all sizes and
composition,

engaged

in

activity-based,

learning

projects.

They

have

many

opportunities to make decisions about their own learning and to develop responsibility.
Students progress at their own best rate and move on when they are ready; there is no
ceiling on the level of work they can do.
CURRICULUM. . . is interdisciplinary/integrated, organized around themes, with many
hands-on activities and in-depth study of content. All levels focus on the skills of
communicating well in oral and written forms and using mathematical concepts to
solve problems. A strong citizenship program emphasizes perseverance, responsibility,
and other life skills. Assessment of learning is based on individual growth and
performance.
PARENT INVOLVEMENT. . . is encouraged and recognized as essential for creating a
nurturing, family-like, school environment. Many parents work in the classroom and
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throughout the school.

Thus thematic teaching is about bringing together various aspects of the curriculum
into meaningful association to focus upon broad areas of study. It views learning and
teaching in a holistic way and reflects the real world, which is interactive. In general,
integrated curriculum or interdisciplinary curriculum include:

A combination of subjects

An emphasis on projects

Sources that go beyond textbooks

Relationships among concepts

Thematic units as organizing principles

Flexible schedules

Flexible student groupings.

Recommended reference reading :

Gardner, H. 1993. l-rarncs of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences, 10th anniversary ed.
New York: Basic Books.
Piaget, J. 1926. The language and thought of the child. New York: Marcourt Brace.
Vygotsky, L. S. 1997. Educational psychology, trans. R. Silverman. Boca Raton, FL: St. Lucie
Press.
Yorks, P. M., and F-. I. PoIIo. 1993. Engagement rates during thematic and traditional
instruction. L;RIC ED 363 412.

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