When developing his curriculum model, Malaguzzi drew from Dewey, the idea that education develops and builds when teachers are collaborative partners and when curriculum is active and meaningful for children. Malaguzzi also drew philosophies and theories from the constructivist theorist Piaget and Vygotsky. Malaguzzi incorporated Piaget’s ideas that curriculum should reflect the way children think and process information. Piaget’s theory that cognitive development occurs in four stages; sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational are also essential to the Reggio Emilia Approach, where the learning process happens over time, developing and growing with each stage of development. Malaguzzi drew from Vygotsky’s idea that there is a zone of proximal development that children best learn when being intentionally guided by their teachers. In the classroom this would be beneficial for educators to recognize and capitalize on to understand what their student’s needs are. When teaching young children it is always important to understand that everyone learns at different speeds and in different ways. Understanding and applying Garner’s …show more content…
A classroom using the Project Approach will provide students with the opportunity to experience inquiry-based learning that enhances the established curriculum. The Project Approach is a framework on how to lead children through an integrated study of a topic (Jaruszewicz 2012). Teachers and students start by planning together, using each individual child’s interest to set learning goals, objectives and outcomes. From there, students research and learn about their chosen topics through different resources and mediums that they have available to them. Then, after they have gathered their thoughts and materials, based on their understanding, they can communicate and represent their findings. Finally, teachers and students can evaluate their previous thoughts about the topic and reflect on what they thought they knew, what they wanted to learn and what they now know. A way to get families involved is to allow this process to be done, in parts at home, and then gather feedback on the appropriateness and effectiveness of the assignment and learning through the perspective of the parents. Based on this process, teachers can adjust the assignment’s process and the learning goals, objectives based on the needs of each child and make other changes