A professor of design and technology at Parsons The New School for Design talks about the value of games and the empowerment of play.

Discussion Questions (edutopia.org)
1. What are the benefits of kids learrning to be designers?
2. Can games help kids build confidence? Why, or why not?
3. Is there educational value to video games? If so, share specific examples.
4. How can teachers and parents use the social nature of games to connect with kids?
5. How can games and game design principles be used in the larger curriculum, especially with assessment?

I just can’t get enough of Growing Schools. I am so thankful that this organizations has the will and the ability to share their projects with us online. Inspiring, educational and fun.

Watch more videos from Growing Schools on their YouTube Channel

(this photographic belongs to my personal archive)

Satomi Izumi-Taylor, University of Memphis
Ingrid Pramling Samuelsson, Göteborg University
Cosby Steele Rogers, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Introduction

“Research regarding play is complex, and culture is a key factor in determining how people in different nations view play. People with different cultural backgrounds tend to pay attention to different characteristics of the same phenomena (Azuma, 1986); because teachers’ perspectives on play are influenced by their own cultures, these perspectives vary widely. Teachers’ perceptions of play affect children’s experiences in their classrooms. Thus, we felt, as scholars doing research in Japan, Sweden, and the United States, that comparing teachers’ perceptions of play in those countries could provide insights that might expand the discourse about play in those countries and internationally. We also felt that our findings could prove useful to those who wish to design effective early childhood education programs.

We anticipate that our research on perspectives on play expressed by American, Japanese, and Swedish early childhood educators can provide a basis for reflection and understanding among the educators in these nations who, in spite of cultural differences, all recognize play as essential in children’s development and learning (Izumi-Taylor, Rogers, & Pramling Samuelsson, 2007).”

…continue reading this article titled Perspectives of Play in Three Nations: A Comparative Study in Japan, the United States, and Sweden via the Early Childhood Research and Practice website

Currently: Santa Monica, CA

Introduction: “The theses represented in this exhibition have been guiding principles in a coherent and tranformational history of experien- ce which, already at the time of the first showing of The Hundred Languages of Children exhibition in 1981, characterised experience in Reggio infant-toddler centres and preschools.

These theses are mindful of the many events causing vast transformations in culture and society, in economics and politics, in Reggio Emilia, in Italy, in the world. These theses are sensitive to guidelines in national curriculum. Above all else however, they are capable of guiding our choices for humanity, for liberty, for democracy.”

The exhibition The Wonder of Learning “presents a narrative and communicative structure designed to reflect the contemporaneity, the complexity, and the plurality of points of view that have always characterized the work carried out in the infant-toddler centres and preschools of Reggio Emilia“

Building, Designing, Exploring, Imagining, Teaching, Thinking

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