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Inquiry, Play, and Early Childhood Education w/ Heidi Echternacht
4 Plays3 months ago
If you go back through the HRP podcast archives, and I encourage you to do just that, you’ll see that we’ve covered just about every topic imaginable in the world of education, with some that keep returning again and again. One area you’ll probably notice a regrettable gap is in early childhood education, PreK-early elementary. One reason is that it’s just out of the experience of the two high school social studies teachers who started the podcast, and another is that foundationally, at least for the classrooms I’ve visited since, PreK-early elementary tends to get a lot more right about developmentally appropriate instruction and schooling than the middle and high school grades that follow. That’s a large part of why I reached out to my guest today to help unpack the ideas that make early childhood education such a powerful and important part of a child’s life.
Heidi Echternacht is co-founder of Kinderchat, a weekly professional conversation, resource library, and online network for early childhood advocates and educators. Created and led by teachers, Kinderchat has hosted global discussions between and among professional educators and in-service teachers for over ten years. Author of The Kinderchat Guide to the Classroom, Heidi has been an educator of children for over 20 years and currently teaches second grade in Princeton, New Jersey.
Connect with Heidi on Bluesky
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Transcript
Learning Through Play: Concepts and Conversations
00:00:00
Speaker
Yes, you can learn through play.
00:00:02
Speaker
Here's how.
00:00:03
Speaker
And those group conversations, the reflection, and then afterwards, the writing for older children, especially, that's the assessment.
00:00:13
Speaker
That's the learning.
00:00:14
Speaker
Because a lot of times people think, well, learning can't occur without assessment.
00:00:18
Speaker
Well, it does all the time.
00:00:21
Speaker
You know, and so how can we assess it through conversation and through the writing?
00:00:27
Speaker
But that's my favorite.
00:00:29
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:00:30
Speaker
Is the grocery store example and all of those things that they came up with and that they realized organically through play.
Podcast Introduction and Supporters
00:00:43
Speaker
Hello and welcome to episode 163 of the Human Restoration Project podcast.
00:00:47
Speaker
My name is Nick Covington.
00:00:49
Speaker
Before we get started, I wanted to let you know that this episode is brought to you by our supporters, three of whom are Anna Wendlet, Kevin Gannon, and Kimberly Baker.
00:00:57
Speaker
Thank you all so much for your ongoing support.
00:01:00
Speaker
And with the help of teacher-powered schools, so-called Moran partners, StemPunks, and WhatSchoolCouldBe, we've also officially announced our fourth annual virtual conference to restore humanity for July 21st through the 23rd, 2025, focused this year on the quest for connection.
00:01:18
Speaker
This year's lineup features a number of workshops and panel discussions with educators like Nawal Karuni, Shanae Bond, Angela Stockman, Shana White, Dr. Emma McMain, Will Richardson, Audrey Waters, and so many more.
00:01:31
Speaker
We honestly couldn't ask for a better dream team to help navigate the challenges facing education in 2025 and beyond.
00:01:38
Speaker
If you're interested in joining us, tickets start at just 50 bucks and you can find the full lineup at humanrestorationproject.org slash conference.
Addressing Gaps in Early Childhood Education Topics
00:01:49
Speaker
If you go back through the HRP podcast archives, and I encourage you to do just that, you'll see that we've covered just about every topic imaginable in the world of education, with some that keep returning again and again and again.
00:02:01
Speaker
But one area you'll probably notice a regrettable gap is in early childhood education, pre-K through early elementary.
00:02:09
Speaker
One reason is that it's just out of the experience of the two high school social studies teachers who started the podcast.
00:02:15
Speaker
And another is that foundationally, at least for the classrooms that I've visited since, pre-K through early elementary tends to get a lot more right about developmentally appropriate instruction and schooling than the middle and high school grades that follow.
00:02:28
Speaker
That's a large part of why I reached out to my guest today to help unpack the ideas that make early childhood education such a powerful and important part of a child's
Heidi Echternacht and KinderChat: Contributions to Education
00:02:37
Speaker
life.
00:02:37
Speaker
Heidi Echternacht is co-founder of KinderChat, a weekly professional conversation, resource library, and online network for early childhood advocates and educators.
00:02:48
Speaker
Created and led by teachers, KinderChat has hosted global discussions between and among professional educators and in-service teachers for over 10 years.
00:02:57
Speaker
Author of The Kinder Chat Guide to the Classroom and The Kinder Chat Guide to Elementary Projects, Heidi has been an educator of children for over 20 years and currently teaches second grade in Princeton, New Jersey.
00:03:09
Speaker
Thanks so much for joining me today, Heidi.
00:03:11
Speaker
I'm glad to be here.
00:03:13
Speaker
There is honestly so much that I want to talk with you about.
00:03:16
Speaker
And I feel like we're just going to scratch the surface of all of that in the scope of this conversation.
KinderChat: A Space for Public Conversations on Education
00:03:22
Speaker
So maybe we can just consider this a starting point for something that we'll have to revisit later.
00:03:26
Speaker
But for those who may not have heard about it, what is KinderChat?
00:03:30
Speaker
How to get started?
00:03:31
Speaker
What are its goals?
00:03:32
Speaker
Basically, it's a public conversation about teaching and learning, about working in the classroom, especially with young children, really focused on young children.
00:03:42
Speaker
And so we, you know, it was sort of the when social media was really coming into its own.
00:03:50
Speaker
And so that's what we did is really just talk about early childhood education and focus on that.
KinderChat Books: Addressing Literature Frustrations
00:03:59
Speaker
And I understand that there are two Kinder Chat books.
00:04:01
Speaker
There's the Kinder Chat Guide to the Classroom, which I have not read, and then the Kinder Chat Guide to Elementary School Projects, which I did read.
00:04:09
Speaker
Can you, I guess, speak to, you have Kinder Chat, the community.
00:04:12
Speaker
Can you speak to the audience and the purpose of the books then?
00:04:16
Speaker
Sure.
00:04:16
Speaker
So the first book, both books are really born out of frustration, right?
00:04:21
Speaker
And so much is born out of frustration, which is back when we started, a lot of the information on early childhood education is either like cutesy or dumbed down, right?
00:04:37
Speaker
So you either run into this cutesy stuff or it's a dumbed down version.
00:04:42
Speaker
And I think you still see that, but-
00:04:45
Speaker
hopefully less so after the work that we've put in.
00:04:49
Speaker
But so the first book is really designed for specifically kindergarten teachers, but you could use it for preschool or even first grade teachers.
Honoring Early Childhood Through KinderChat Books
00:05:00
Speaker
But it's really designed to, let's talk about that specific age because it really is a unique age in the school.
00:05:09
Speaker
And so it's really designed to show how do you honor
00:05:15
Speaker
you know, that age of child without dumbing things down and without, you know, being cutesy about it.
00:05:22
Speaker
So that's really what the goals are of that book.
00:05:25
Speaker
The second book is born again out of frustration of people really not understanding why play is so important and how play is learning.
The Critical Role of Play in Learning
00:05:38
Speaker
And it's not just something that young children do.
00:05:41
Speaker
So I think that's also part of it with early childhood education.
00:05:45
Speaker
A lot of people dismiss it as something that, you know, that's for little kids.
00:05:50
Speaker
Play is for little kids.
00:05:52
Speaker
And the second book really talks about, no, it's not for little kids.
00:05:56
Speaker
It's for everyone.
00:05:57
Speaker
And it's really how we learn.
00:06:00
Speaker
And so that book spends a lot more time breaking down sort of different approaches to more project-based learning and then really listing how to do it with play.
00:06:14
Speaker
Can you speak more to that?
00:06:16
Speaker
Like what what to you that are those like foundational elements that that make in your mind like the most developmentally appropriate sound education experience for kids in that age range?
Play as a Primary Language for Children
00:06:33
Speaker
So, I mean, play is how children talk to one another.
00:06:36
Speaker
So, like in the first book, I talk a lot about nonverbal communication.
00:06:40
Speaker
You know, it's massive as a communicator.
00:06:44
Speaker
And early childhood teachers are very good at that, looking at facial expressions and, you know, body language and really being expressive, right?
00:06:53
Speaker
So that's part of communication.
00:06:55
Speaker
But children are speaking differently.
00:06:57
Speaker
through their play.
00:06:58
Speaker
That's how that's their, their main language is really talking through that.
00:07:04
Speaker
And so it's not something frivolous, it's communication, it's language.
00:07:09
Speaker
And that's how you have to approach it is what are they saying through this play?
00:07:14
Speaker
It's a process of listening to that.
00:07:17
Speaker
So that's kind of where the lens I'm viewing it from.
00:07:21
Speaker
And I think what I loved about the Kinder Chat Guide to Elementary School Projects, the one that I read, is that you give several practical examples and you make an emphasis in
The KinderChat Guide to Elementary Projects
00:07:31
Speaker
the intro to the book.
00:07:31
Speaker
Like this is not like the theory book.
00:07:34
Speaker
You go over those ideas in the beginning to help set things up.
00:07:37
Speaker
But then you say, here is what they look like in action.
00:07:39
Speaker
And you break those down into projects on the town and the neighborhood, civics and society, nature and the world, and then working together in the digital world.
00:07:52
Speaker
Can you perhaps just give us an example of what implementing these ideas looks like in the context of your own classroom through the lens of your work?
Natural Learning Environments and Teacher Roles
00:08:02
Speaker
One of the things I love about teaching is that when you do it really well, you don't notice it.
00:08:09
Speaker
And so you could walk into my classroom and think, what's going on here?
00:08:12
Speaker
You know, it looks like nothing's happening.
00:08:15
Speaker
But when you're looking more closely, right, and you say, OK, well, there's a child on a bicycle and there's a child working on computers on a different project.
00:08:26
Speaker
They're five.
00:08:28
Speaker
They're self-directed.
00:08:29
Speaker
You know, oh, there's a child.
00:08:31
Speaker
playing right now, we're playing laundry and she's doing that.
00:08:36
Speaker
And so they're doing all these very different things.
00:08:39
Speaker
And so you might think, what are they doing?
00:08:42
Speaker
It doesn't look like anything.
00:08:44
Speaker
So that's one of the, my most favorite things about early childhood is it often looks like so natural that
00:08:53
Speaker
that you could easily miss it.
00:08:56
Speaker
And so that's why the interpretation is so important.
00:09:00
Speaker
And that's the job of the teacher is to interpret what they're doing.
00:09:04
Speaker
Each of those sections in the book is really designed to, it's how children make sense of things.
Co-constructing Learning Environments
00:09:13
Speaker
So it's the sphere almost of a sense.
00:09:16
Speaker
So for example, the town and neighborhood, that makes a lot of sense to a child because they know,
00:09:24
Speaker
what things you might see in a town or what things you might see in a neighborhood.
00:09:29
Speaker
They have an idea of that.
00:09:31
Speaker
And so then we can co-construct the laundromat, for example.
00:09:35
Speaker
They might see that in their house or they might live in a city and they can help make that come alive.
00:09:43
Speaker
And so that's the fun of it is that we're co-constructing.
00:09:48
Speaker
But then I don't want to say fun because people dismiss that.
00:09:51
Speaker
That's the learning.
00:09:53
Speaker
So what kinds of things might you see in the laundry?
00:09:56
Speaker
What are people doing in the laundry?
00:09:58
Speaker
And let's see now how we're going to put that together to make sense.
00:10:03
Speaker
And people are so dismissive of that play aspect because they wonder, like, how do you know that kids are learning something?
00:10:08
Speaker
And I think the answer is often like so obvious that people maybe just dismiss it
Reflecting on Play and Economic Concepts
00:10:15
Speaker
as being too easy.
00:10:15
Speaker
And the answer is really just like talk to kids, ask them those questions.
00:10:20
Speaker
They will speak to you about their experiences and their sense making.
00:10:23
Speaker
And then
00:10:24
Speaker
the role of the teacher becomes, oh, putting the concepts to those things.
00:10:28
Speaker
And I really underlined an example in that town and neighborhood where the kids were playing grocery store.
00:10:34
Speaker
Yes.
00:10:35
Speaker
And then you go through, I love that one so much because then you include the responses from a group of fourth graders who are working at the store during their social studies class time.
00:10:45
Speaker
And there's honestly nothing more powerful than just hearing it in students' own words.
00:10:49
Speaker
So they each had different roles that were in the grocery store.
00:10:53
Speaker
Some were stockers, cashiers, bankers, managers.
00:10:58
Speaker
And they say things like, you don't want to sell the food for too much because no one will want to buy it.
00:11:04
Speaker
10 units is too much.
00:11:05
Speaker
Okay.
00:11:06
Speaker
Then what economic concepts is that student speaking to, right?
00:11:10
Speaker
They're speaking to something I taught to high school seniors about supply and demand, right?
00:11:15
Speaker
And here's a fourth grader nailing that same thing.
00:11:18
Speaker
Let's see.
00:11:18
Speaker
Somebody else speaks to prices.
00:11:20
Speaker
Oh, someone else says the workers take charge of their jobs.
00:11:23
Speaker
Sometimes there's arguments, but they find a way to work together, right?
00:11:27
Speaker
Like, and who as an adult hasn't experienced, you know, those interpersonal tensions at work or even like ones that arise, you know, to like legal means, right?
00:11:37
Speaker
There's a relationship between employees and employers, right?
00:11:41
Speaker
We got to navigate all of those things.
00:11:42
Speaker
Kids are experiencing that.
Play vs. Direct Instruction: Understanding and Efficiency
00:11:45
Speaker
So speaking to it, and then again, our job as educators to put those concepts on it, and you ask that teachers go further to ask students to write and reflect upon those things too, because another thing that we know from Dewey is like, we don't learn from experience, we learn from
00:12:01
Speaker
reflecting on those experiences.
00:12:03
Speaker
So giving kids those frameworks.
00:12:05
Speaker
I just, again, I kind of have a smile on my face and chills just thinking about that experience that kids have and those aha moments that emerge later as they're reflecting on it.
00:12:16
Speaker
And that's the beauty of it.
00:12:17
Speaker
I think the grocery store is probably my strongest example where you can really see, because when you start playing, a lot of projects approach it as let's learn all about the grocery store and now what kinds of things.
00:12:32
Speaker
And then we go into food and maybe food production.
00:12:35
Speaker
Okay.
00:12:35
Speaker
And we come at it from an adult perspective, right?
00:12:39
Speaker
But when I say, okay, let's play grocery store.
00:12:42
Speaker
Okay.
00:12:43
Speaker
What are the jobs that might be there?
00:12:45
Speaker
And now whose turn is it right to be the cashier?
00:12:49
Speaker
And now we're fighting.
00:12:50
Speaker
We're arguing over that as, as children do.
00:12:53
Speaker
Right.
00:12:54
Speaker
And, oh my gosh, we can't have an argument.
00:12:56
Speaker
No.
00:12:56
Speaker
What happens?
00:12:57
Speaker
How can we take turns?
00:12:58
Speaker
Well, shifts.
00:12:59
Speaker
Right.
00:13:00
Speaker
Right.
00:13:01
Speaker
Shift work.
00:13:02
Speaker
And you wouldn't think that that is a primary place.
00:13:07
Speaker
But yes, it is.
00:13:08
Speaker
And what comes of that?
00:13:10
Speaker
OK, well, there's different roles in the grocery store and it comes very organically.
00:13:16
Speaker
And from that, then, okay, what comes next and what comes next?
00:13:21
Speaker
And so, and absolutely.
00:13:22
Speaker
And then the conversation about that as groups.
00:13:26
Speaker
So I think that's the, the book tries to get at that.
00:13:31
Speaker
Yes, you can learn through play.
00:13:33
Speaker
Here's how.
00:13:35
Speaker
And that convert those group conversations, the reflection, and then afterwards the writing for older children, um, especially is, is the, that's the assessment.
00:13:48
Speaker
That's the learning.
00:13:49
Speaker
Cause a lot of times people think, well, learning can't occur without assessment.
00:13:53
Speaker
Well, it does all the time.
00:13:56
Speaker
And so how can we assess it through conversation and through the writing?
00:14:02
Speaker
That's my favorite.
00:14:03
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:14:03
Speaker
Is the grocery store example and all of those things that they came up with and that they realized organically through play.
00:14:13
Speaker
Yeah.
00:14:13
Speaker
And then to explain to them how those have their counterparts in like the quote unquote real world outside of school as adults have had to navigate these same things, right?
00:14:23
Speaker
They're living and experiencing and playing in this low stakes microcosm of like the whole world and what a great, great experience for them.
00:14:32
Speaker
And I think another thing that you write about in the book is how often, again, play is kind of derided or dismissed.
00:14:40
Speaker
Because, you know, it's not viewed as being efficient.
00:14:43
Speaker
There might not be some super concrete learning objectives.
00:14:46
Speaker
You're not in control of the clock at all the time or the pace at which students are learning.
00:14:50
Speaker
But one thing.
00:14:51
Speaker
realization that kind of came to me is that, well, in a lot of, imagine that you had to like direct instruct the grocery store, right?
00:14:59
Speaker
How long that would take months, right?
00:15:02
Speaker
For each kid to individually read and learn about the roles, right?
00:15:07
Speaker
Take these assessments.
00:15:08
Speaker
You have lessons about the cashier, the stocker, how you do all of those things, et cetera.
00:15:13
Speaker
And by the time you get to the play part, right?
00:15:16
Speaker
It's all of the
00:15:18
Speaker
emergent ideas are sucked out of it, right?
00:15:21
Speaker
Kids are bored.
00:15:22
Speaker
They're not actually learning.
00:15:23
Speaker
They're just executing on like some pre-programmed design.
00:15:27
Speaker
So it was kind of like the antidote to that argument that like play is inefficient because kids are actually incorporating those ideas into, again,
00:15:37
Speaker
I'm going to use some Piaget things here, like their existing schemes, you know, to say like, okay, they're embodying those ideas as they learn them, as opposed to like through some kind of more rigid direct instruction, having to learn things that are outside of them and then transfer and incorporate it later, which is a much more inefficient process.
00:15:59
Speaker
So a plus one to those ideas, right?
00:16:02
Speaker
You nailed it.
00:16:03
Speaker
I mean, that's it.
00:16:04
Speaker
That's it exactly is that when you compare the amount of time, you know, this grocery store was a two week project and that's what they got out of that.
00:16:13
Speaker
You know, now, meanwhile, I am feeding in the back.
00:16:17
Speaker
There are some ideas about economics that I have been feeding through actually a gameplay through.
00:16:23
Speaker
There was a game.
00:16:24
Speaker
that we were playing online that was talking about supply and demand, but that was separate.
00:16:31
Speaker
And then here they're really using that.
00:16:34
Speaker
So the time difference is amazing.
00:16:37
Speaker
It was a two week project versus, you know, all that time, as you're saying, is it is really efficient.
00:16:46
Speaker
Yeah.
00:16:47
Speaker
Or, you know, taking a test at the end of a unit about grocery stores.
00:16:50
Speaker
Like, again, like the weird schoolish things that we do that try to make, put learning into a box that, you know, that it really isn't particularly for these younger kids.
Challenges and Misconceptions in Play-Based Learning
00:17:00
Speaker
As we've been talking about, you know, the idea of inquiry, oh my gosh, and play are sometimes...
00:17:06
Speaker
dismissed outright or used as insulting derogatory words to describe practices that people don't like.
00:17:13
Speaker
But like, why do you think that used to be, you know, the center of so much of early childhood up through middle school, right?
00:17:21
Speaker
Now it's the case that kids don't even get recess when they hit, say, sixth grade or seventh grade.
00:17:26
Speaker
We decide to put all of these 12-year-olds who are all at the same weird stage in their...
00:17:32
Speaker
You know, adolescents all in the same room.
00:17:35
Speaker
And they were like, oh, my gosh, the middle school experience sucks for kids and adults and everyone else.
00:17:39
Speaker
So, like, why do you think?
00:17:41
Speaker
For me, I'll put my cards on the table here.
00:17:43
Speaker
I think inquiry and play are like the healing factors that could really resolve some of those issues.
00:17:49
Speaker
But why do you think in your experience, you know, 20 years doing this work in elementary and then helping teachers out there, too, why are these things such a tough sell to teachers in schools?
00:18:00
Speaker
It's a very interesting thing.
00:18:03
Speaker
You know, I think it's mostly because people don't understand it.
00:18:08
Speaker
And that would be primary because underneath that is all these things.
00:18:13
Speaker
Lack of curiosity.
00:18:15
Speaker
Well, why is it important?
00:18:17
Speaker
The idea that you can conquer knowledge.
00:18:21
Speaker
And this is a basic idea, right?
00:18:23
Speaker
Is that the way we learn, some people would say it's a ladder of skills, right?
00:18:30
Speaker
And other people are saying it's a concept map, more like that.
00:18:34
Speaker
It's a construction map.
00:18:35
Speaker
And so you have those two ideas that are constantly going back and forth.
00:18:40
Speaker
And I mean, it's a little bit of both, but we definitely have in America, we want things to be easy and everybody's looking for that easy thing and that achievement, right?
00:18:54
Speaker
It's easier to stick a badge on somebody and say, okay, well, you've achieved unlocked level four, right?
00:19:00
Speaker
right, than it is to talk about the understanding, which is a totally different kind of way of looking at things, which is conceptual.
00:19:12
Speaker
That's the main reason.
00:19:14
Speaker
And underneath all of that, going back to people don't understand it, then you have a lack of support for, you know,
00:19:21
Speaker
If you don't understand it, you can't support it.
00:19:24
Speaker
And then it's also hard to do well.
00:19:26
Speaker
It's not an easy thing.
00:19:28
Speaker
And so you have all of those pressures coming on to a teacher or a school system or whatever it is.
00:19:37
Speaker
And it's easier just to kind of say, okay, forget it.
00:19:40
Speaker
I'll do a little project designed for that.
00:19:45
Speaker
And then I'll spend the rest of my time, you know,
00:19:48
Speaker
covering subjects and moving through the, the, the coverage of it rather than really diving into understanding and then play also, you know, inquiries on one side and then you have play on the other.
00:20:03
Speaker
is people look at play as a break from learning because it's dismissed into recess.
00:20:10
Speaker
So recess is when they go outside and go crazy and there's chaos.
00:20:15
Speaker
And that's when all the fights happen, all the arguments happen.
00:20:18
Speaker
So play is bad.
00:20:19
Speaker
because it's a break from learning.
00:20:20
Speaker
That's when trouble begins.
00:20:22
Speaker
We've got to cut it.
00:20:23
Speaker
No, it's actually the opposite.
00:20:25
Speaker
And it's when they're applying what they've learned.
00:20:29
Speaker
So if they've learned that unkindness, for example, gets you forward, we're going to use that during our playtime.
00:20:38
Speaker
Or if some kid's struggling during play, you know, they're going to use that.
00:20:42
Speaker
That's when all the reality of things come out at playtime.
00:20:46
Speaker
and more behaviors.
00:20:48
Speaker
But that also speaks to, uh, you know, mental health and wellness of children.
00:20:53
Speaker
And that the more you take that play away, you're also seeing a rise in that frustration level and all of those things.
00:21:02
Speaker
That's a little different side note, but that these things are really all together.
00:21:08
Speaker
So, um,
00:21:09
Speaker
you know, especially in lower income where you want to try to get achievement, achievement, achievement, you take the play out, which is the worst thing you could do because the amount of language that happens, the amount of intersecting concepts that happen, you know, they need more, more play because the wealthy schools certainly aren't taking play out.
00:21:33
Speaker
But the
00:21:34
Speaker
You know, I'm now going into other things, but that is the reason I would say why those two concepts are very dismissed is primarily because of those things.
00:21:44
Speaker
Misunderstanding.
00:21:46
Speaker
And all of the things you talk about, they're all related, right?
00:21:49
Speaker
So once you start to look at that problem, yeah, it branches off in a hundred different directions and you begin to see it for what it is.
00:21:57
Speaker
And to begin to maybe unpack it, right?
00:22:00
Speaker
I try to reconcile the notion of achievement and how we measure that with the kinds of things that we were just talking about in the student reflections on, say, their role at the grocery
Student Reflections vs. Standardized Assessments
00:22:10
Speaker
store, right?
00:22:10
Speaker
How does that
00:22:11
Speaker
experience and that student reflection, which to me clearly demonstrates some amount of deep learning, right?
00:22:17
Speaker
How does that get reflected in the kinds of assessments that states and schools put a lot of value in, right?
00:22:24
Speaker
I mean, standardized tests are really like two subjects, like reading and math for a lot of elementary kids.
00:22:30
Speaker
And, you know, if you can't put learning into a box that can be measured on those assessments, then it doesn't count, you know?
00:22:37
Speaker
And so again, to speak to what you had said there about the
00:22:41
Speaker
Teachers don't have a lot of models, right?
00:22:43
Speaker
If you're in a place where high stakes testing is really prominent, valued, the stressors are all around that.
00:22:50
Speaker
Well, then that might be the life that you know as a professional educator, right?
00:22:55
Speaker
And that's how you try to get your kids to perform.
00:22:58
Speaker
And then to speak to support,
00:23:00
Speaker
definitely like in our experience too, trying to teach teachers, even at the middle and high school level, how to implement some of these ideas and how to take a look at project-based learning.
00:23:12
Speaker
A lot of them have been burned in the past, right?
00:23:16
Speaker
They were once, you know, young and excited and they tried this thing once and it blew up in their face.
00:23:22
Speaker
And they were like, whoa, that approach doesn't work, you know, because it didn't work for me that one time.
00:23:27
Speaker
And I totally get that, right?
00:23:29
Speaker
If you
00:23:30
Speaker
went through all the effort to plan and implement and do all these things and it blew up, you would go back to the safe thing.
00:23:35
Speaker
I totally get that.
00:23:37
Speaker
So there is like that need for teachers to be supported systemically, right?
00:23:42
Speaker
For administrators and PLCs and all those other, you know, professional learning opportunities we put in place to
00:23:50
Speaker
wraparound teachers to say, hey, we're all going to try and you might fail.
00:23:54
Speaker
And that's part of the learning process, too.
00:23:56
Speaker
How do we model for educators the kinds of things that we want to model for kids like and build those systemic supports?
00:24:05
Speaker
I think it's the heart of the situation.
00:24:08
Speaker
You know, I think it's the because a lot of people you go to the PBL session, you're excited, it fails, and then you bail out and then it doesn't work.
00:24:20
Speaker
So understanding underneath that it's okay, first of all, that it didn't work and that it is a complex system, you know, and that goes feeds back into, well, why is this resisted?
00:24:33
Speaker
It's because it's hard.
00:24:34
Speaker
It's not easy to do.
00:24:36
Speaker
And we're all looking for that easy thing in some ways.
00:24:40
Speaker
But really what we're ultimately looking for is building understanding, building sense-making, you know, doing all, and that's what this, these books and all of this came out of is, you know, 20 years plus of trying to make sense of education and all this stuff is how this all fits together.
00:25:00
Speaker
You know, I think it's very important to talk about
00:25:03
Speaker
the complexity of it, and very important to talk about the support, because without it, you can't really do it.
00:25:11
Speaker
But it's still important to know about as educators regardless.
00:25:17
Speaker
And I also think the thinking about learning as a ladder or learning as a concept map, as conceptual sense making is
00:25:27
Speaker
is very, very important.
00:25:29
Speaker
And that speaks to kind of the Reggio piece that has been threaded through all of this is in there.
00:25:38
Speaker
But that's, you know, what comes next on our conversation.
00:25:43
Speaker
Yeah, that's very funny.
00:25:46
Speaker
I will, I guess before we transition into that, I will give one more plug, at least for the Kinder Chat Guide to Elementary School projects, because you're very clear in here who say the two worst things that you can do in this case is both over plan and like suck the life out of it and never actually get to the good stuff.
00:26:05
Speaker
And also on the flip side, under plan.
00:26:07
Speaker
Right.
00:26:08
Speaker
Because then you do kids have a bad time and you have a bad time.
00:26:11
Speaker
Everyone feels bad.
00:26:12
Speaker
That's not great.
00:26:14
Speaker
And that's why I think the book like says you could do these projects.
00:26:18
Speaker
And it's like start with this framework, build it into your own context.
00:26:23
Speaker
Right.
00:26:23
Speaker
Like professional educators are awesome at learning.
00:26:27
Speaker
connecting ideas to kids.
00:26:29
Speaker
And you say, here's this framework that I used in my class with my kids.
00:26:34
Speaker
You take that framework and try the same thing out on your own.
00:26:36
Speaker
So at least it takes a little bit of the risk and the heat out from teachers planning from scratch their own thing, seeing it fail.
00:26:44
Speaker
It's got the Heidi stamp of approval that said, I've at least tried this thing.
00:26:47
Speaker
Go try it in your own context.
00:26:49
Speaker
So yeah, one last quick plug for that, because I think that's a real great strategy for teachers.
00:26:54
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:54
Speaker
Well, and thank you for bringing that up because the adult is the, is the worst enemy of the, of the project in some ways is because they, they want to set it up in, in the adult frame, you know, and then they take over the play and it's like, no, no, you could, you got to back up.
00:27:13
Speaker
So you do need to understand play in order to do these.
00:27:17
Speaker
And I think that that's, I thank you for bringing this up because, you know,
00:27:22
Speaker
Teachers need to understand that very clearly and spend more time watching children play.
00:27:29
Speaker
Teachers of all ages.
00:27:31
Speaker
Because then you see what they do and then you just feed it.
00:27:38
Speaker
You just start to feed the need.
00:27:41
Speaker
And that's really the art of it.
00:27:44
Speaker
But then constructing, you'd be surprised at how difficult it is to construct things.
00:27:51
Speaker
a whole micro society, right?
00:27:54
Speaker
A micro economic, you know, with a bank and a grocery store, you have to really think ahead.
00:28:02
Speaker
So you're thinking ahead, but you're also thinking behind.
00:28:06
Speaker
So it's a different way of thinking that I think teachers would really enjoy once you get started.
00:28:13
Speaker
It's very fun.
00:28:15
Speaker
But teachers are absolutely I've seen I've seen it where they just take over and you're like, you're killing it.
00:28:21
Speaker
Don't do it.
00:28:23
Speaker
But you have to really trust children.
00:28:25
Speaker
And I think that that's the other thing underneath here is that.
00:28:29
Speaker
learning more about play and trusting children and just watching what they do and then feeding their needs.
00:28:37
Speaker
You know, that's, that is, um, the primary thing is listening really is listening.
00:28:45
Speaker
You know, like in baking, there is the concept of like over mixing and over kneading.
00:28:49
Speaker
Like at some point, you got to step back and just say like the ingredients are together.
00:28:53
Speaker
If I overdo it, it's going to ruin the final product.
00:28:56
Speaker
And this was a habit.
00:28:58
Speaker
And I think as teachers, we just get trained by the system, right?
00:29:01
Speaker
Because you got to go, go, go everything.
00:29:03
Speaker
You're going 100 miles an hour with your hair on fire.
00:29:06
Speaker
And one thing that I found myself being really bad at when I stepped out of the classroom was just observing.
00:29:12
Speaker
Right.
00:29:12
Speaker
Just stepping back, being an observer to a space and noticing because so often teachers were doers.
00:29:19
Speaker
Right.
00:29:19
Speaker
We want to get in there and we want to do a good job.
00:29:22
Speaker
Right.
00:29:22
Speaker
And we want to be sometimes the star of the show.
00:29:25
Speaker
We want to help kids.
00:29:26
Speaker
We want to do everything else.
00:29:27
Speaker
And it's so hard just to step back and just say, hey,
00:29:30
Speaker
Let the process work and see and intervene if something's going terrible, right?
00:29:35
Speaker
Or if there's a oil spill or a kid sticks his finger in the socket, by all means.
00:29:41
Speaker
But in lieu of that, maybe just watch things unfold.
00:29:44
Speaker
And yeah, that's, again, something that just takes a lot of time and a lot of practice to get to.
00:29:50
Speaker
Well, and that's one of my favorite things.
00:29:51
Speaker
You have the, you know, helicopter parents.
00:29:54
Speaker
who are sitting over the child and watching them eat the cupcake and trying to control, you know, and oh my gosh, she spilled a little icing.
00:30:03
Speaker
And then you have the stand back parents who are watching the helicopter parents and saying, see them helicopter.
00:30:09
Speaker
And meanwhile, the helicopter parents are standing back.
00:30:11
Speaker
How could they're not involved?
00:30:13
Speaker
You know, look at those parents standing back.
00:30:15
Speaker
They they're not involved.
00:30:17
Speaker
So it's, it's a funny thing that, that, you know,
00:30:21
Speaker
It takes time.
00:30:22
Speaker
It does take time and confidence to be able to stand back and observe.
00:30:28
Speaker
The reward for that though, right?
00:30:29
Speaker
Trusting kids means that they can be trusted.
00:30:34
Speaker
Exactly what you said there.
00:30:35
Speaker
And just like we would with adults, if I didn't trust the other people that I worked with, that would harm those relationships and our ability to get that work done.
00:30:43
Speaker
If I was micromanaging and doing all that, part of kids being able to step up, right?
00:30:49
Speaker
We always say kids need to own their learning and all these things.
00:30:51
Speaker
Give them the chance to.
00:30:53
Speaker
And I give
00:30:55
Speaker
more or less infinite grace to teachers because there's just so much systemic pressures.
00:30:58
Speaker
But at some point, right, we have to take a little bit of agency and just say, like, I'm not going to intervene in this place or I'm going to let this play out because I know in the long run that's what's best for kids.
00:31:09
Speaker
Now,
00:31:11
Speaker
Oh, that's soapbox.
00:31:15
Speaker
We've been talking about a lot of important thinkers and frameworks that are at the heart of play and inquiry-based learning.
Reggio Emilia Philosophy: Post-War Educational Response
00:31:23
Speaker
Dewey and Piaget's constructivism, Papert's constructionism, and somewhere in between those two ideas in historical development emerges Reggio Emilia.
00:31:34
Speaker
whose ideas about inquiry play and student sensemaking seems to suffuse the practices and projects that you write about for KinderChat.
00:31:42
Speaker
And Reggio was not something that was really on my radar until just last year when I heard Mera Krachewski, who's someone who has worked at Reggio schools and is really like a huge academic and documentarian of that work.
00:31:55
Speaker
I heard her speak about regio and pedagogical documentation at the Progressive Education Network Conference, and it kind of blew my mind.
00:32:02
Speaker
And I feel like in another life, I really missed my calling to be a regio pedagogista, or however we might conjugate that.
00:32:10
Speaker
I don't know if that's a gender neutral term, but could you explain?
00:32:15
Speaker
I mean, I'm so excited about this idea, the historical context.
00:32:19
Speaker
Could you just explain a bit for listeners who don't know that historical development,
00:32:23
Speaker
how it emerges in that particular context of post-war Italy and what some of the fundamental pillars perhaps of the Reggio practice are?
00:32:32
Speaker
Sure.
00:32:32
Speaker
Well, I am no expert on it.
00:32:35
Speaker
I'll say that because, you know, it takes years of study.
00:32:40
Speaker
to, to, um, to learn about it.
00:32:43
Speaker
And that's another reason why a lot of people don't know about it is because it takes a long time to figure out what, what's going on.
00:32:49
Speaker
Right.
00:32:51
Speaker
Um, and, and again, people are looking for that easy answer, but it is a philosophy of education basically, um, that was born out of, uh,
00:33:02
Speaker
out of World War II, out of a, is a reaction towards, uh, almost towards certainty.
00:33:08
Speaker
You can almost say it towards certainty.
00:33:11
Speaker
That's, that's what the reaction is.
00:33:14
Speaker
So, um,
00:33:15
Speaker
central to the philosophy is, um, teacher as interpreter.
00:33:22
Speaker
Okay.
00:33:23
Speaker
Interpreter of children of, of their, uh, of the language of children, essentially, what are they doing?
00:33:32
Speaker
What are they talking about?
00:33:33
Speaker
And that interpretation takes place through from child to teacher, from teacher to government teacher to society, community,
00:33:45
Speaker
and teacher to teacher, right?
00:33:47
Speaker
So there is this, the teacher is doing the work of translation and interpretation.
00:33:55
Speaker
And that is a very different view than teacher as deliverer of information, right?
00:34:02
Speaker
Which is how we would primarily in America say the role of teacher is to deliver the information or to deliver the information
00:34:11
Speaker
the knowledge, right?
00:34:13
Speaker
And this is saying teacher is the interpreter.
00:34:17
Speaker
So that is very different.
00:34:18
Speaker
And that is the key point, I think.
00:34:23
Speaker
And behind that is documenting.
00:34:26
Speaker
So there's an emphasis on documenting the thought process of children, right?
00:34:33
Speaker
So in addition to that, there is this emphasis on the project approach really is the...
00:34:43
Speaker
basis of and constructing knowledge and how is knowledge put together so it's really trying to get at the fundamentals of how knowledge is constructed that's the basic thing but it is a hugely complex and fascinating i'm so impressed you read the books i'm like oh my gosh look at you
00:35:06
Speaker
Because it does unlock real interesting concepts that I think are essential to the practice of teaching and learning and education today.
00:35:16
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:35:17
Speaker
So I encourage people to really dive in and learn more.
00:35:22
Speaker
It's not like you can become an expert on Reggio.
00:35:25
Speaker
You enter into dialogue with Reggio.
00:35:28
Speaker
So there's all these little shifts in language that...
00:35:32
Speaker
You know, at first you think, why, what is that?
00:35:35
Speaker
And then the more you learn about it, you're like, okay, that is actually an important shift.
00:35:41
Speaker
Yeah, it more or less seems like a 180, you know, from the American mindset.
00:35:46
Speaker
And that historical context, I mean, as a history person, a history teacher, is so fascinating to see a pedagogy emerge directly out of the response to, like, the conditions that created fascism in Italy in World War II, right?
00:36:01
Speaker
So here you have, you know, in this little Italian town, you have a group of people who are, like, you know, committed to making that
00:36:10
Speaker
world not happen again.
00:36:12
Speaker
And so then, yeah, developing ideas, developing, you know, processes, it's really ways of thinking about
00:36:21
Speaker
children and their relationship to society and the role that school plays in all of that and really taking it very seriously because, I mean, my God, in the post-war period, we're still living in the aftermath of that.
00:36:38
Speaker
And I think a lot of people, and I would say myself included until very recently, will see another Italian-sounding name in the form of a Montessori school, right?
00:36:48
Speaker
So...
00:36:48
Speaker
So maybe, maybe you're driving down the road, you see like, oh, there's a Montessori school.
00:36:53
Speaker
You're looking, you see a Reggio Emilia.
00:36:54
Speaker
Those must kind of be two flavors of the same thing here.
00:36:58
Speaker
What I learned is that they're not, and I felt like a real dum-dum for, for thinking that.
00:37:03
Speaker
Can you talk then about those differences?
00:37:06
Speaker
If I'm just like, again, a parent driving down the street and I see a couple of those programs, what in the world is the difference other than the, you know, different Italian names?
00:37:15
Speaker
it's very interesting that Montessori, and this goes back to the crux of how learning is constructed, right?
00:37:24
Speaker
So a lot of people think Montessori is this very free choice thing.
00:37:29
Speaker
No, it is extremely controlled.
00:37:33
Speaker
It is very ladders, right?
00:37:35
Speaker
So the child is, child is individual, okay?
00:37:41
Speaker
The individual child is,
00:37:44
Speaker
interacting with the environment in a way that they choose.
00:37:49
Speaker
Yes.
00:37:49
Speaker
But the material, so each material, there's not a toy, right?
00:37:53
Speaker
It's not just a toy.
00:37:55
Speaker
It's, it's a material for learning.
00:37:58
Speaker
And so that they approach that toy and then they, you know, achieve that learning within that toy.
00:38:07
Speaker
And then, then they can go to the next level, right?
00:38:10
Speaker
So it is, and that's why they have multi-age, right?
00:38:13
Speaker
Because you might have a three-year-old and a five-year-old who are progressing at the same level.
00:38:18
Speaker
So it is highly individualistic, but it is, this is how the toy is and why it's, it's, it's what it's teaching you.
00:38:28
Speaker
And you then achieve that and then move to the next level of, of work.
00:38:34
Speaker
And I shouldn't say toy, you know, that would not be what it is.
00:38:37
Speaker
It's, it's a material for, um, designed to teach a specific skill.
00:38:44
Speaker
And so, um, Montessori is really approaching learning as a ladder that you are climbing and you're doing it individualistically and it is very structured.
00:38:56
Speaker
Okay.
00:38:56
Speaker
So that, that, that, that's on that side.
00:39:00
Speaker
Right.
00:39:00
Speaker
And, and the most interesting part is Mussolini loved.
00:39:04
Speaker
Reggio, or not Reggio, Montessori, I'm sorry.
00:39:07
Speaker
Mussolini loved it.
00:39:09
Speaker
And I just became so interested in thinking about why.
00:39:14
Speaker
And that unlocked a lot for me in terms of the disadvantages of ladder structures of learning.
00:39:26
Speaker
And I don't mean scaffolding because scaffolding is also a little bit different, but that achievement based, I'm going to just say that.
00:39:34
Speaker
in comparison to Reggio, which is a reaction against Mussolini, really.
00:39:42
Speaker
And so it is much more conceptual and it is much more group based.
00:39:47
Speaker
Let's talk about this as a group.
00:39:49
Speaker
And here's a reflection.
00:39:51
Speaker
Here's a dialogue of what the group was thinking.
00:39:55
Speaker
And here's documentation of that.
00:39:57
Speaker
And here's how we did that and approached that.
00:40:00
Speaker
So they're two very different approaches.
00:40:04
Speaker
And you won't really go and see a Reggio school because it's not something that's formalized.
00:40:12
Speaker
You'll see schools that say Reggio inspired.
00:40:15
Speaker
And a lot of those, some of them don't know that.
00:40:20
Speaker
even a lot of the complexity that is in there.
00:40:24
Speaker
And some are unbelievably beautiful.
00:40:26
Speaker
I visited some Reggio schools in New Jersey, and they really understand exactly what's happening.
00:40:34
Speaker
So there is, and you'll see that in Montessori as well.
00:40:37
Speaker
You'll see a wide variation, a wide interpretation.
00:40:41
Speaker
So it's not easy to know about.
00:40:43
Speaker
That's why a lot of people don't know about it.
00:40:46
Speaker
So I just found the contrast between the two so interesting.
00:40:53
Speaker
I was really captivated by that idea.
00:40:57
Speaker
Yeah, it is wild to read about that history and to think Maria Montessori is starting up this method in these schools, like in the pre-war, like in the 30s in Italy.
00:41:08
Speaker
And then Mussolini comes along.
00:41:09
Speaker
He's like, oh, this is great.
00:41:11
Speaker
Like, I want to teach everybody about Italian nationalism through these Montessori schools.
00:41:16
Speaker
And my understanding, I mean, I haven't like studied it so much, but is that Montessori was like horrified by that.
00:41:24
Speaker
She bails.
00:41:25
Speaker
She comes to the United States.
00:41:27
Speaker
And that's kind of when, you know, I don't know the relationship between Dewey and Montessori, but, you know, they're kind of navigating the same time period there.
00:41:35
Speaker
So, yeah, it is just very interesting to think like the Montessori has that reputation of being like this open, loose, like Sudbury school sort of thing.
00:41:45
Speaker
And it's like a really tightly controlled method that kind of shocked me.
00:41:49
Speaker
And Reggio.
00:41:50
Speaker
as like, I don't mean, a mindset?
00:41:53
Speaker
It's like really a way of bringing an idea into a space and then just like setting up, I don't know, like setting up the environment so that way the idea can emerge organically.
00:42:07
Speaker
I guess I don't know, but it's so wild.
00:42:10
Speaker
There is one really key idea from Reggio that I'm fascinated about bringing into every classroom context, and that is
00:42:18
Speaker
the pedagogical documentation piece, because I love the idea that like the student, it brings student thinking and learning into this public
Democratic Learning Through Public Documentation
00:42:27
Speaker
space.
00:42:27
Speaker
It makes it democratic.
00:42:29
Speaker
It makes it visible.
00:42:30
Speaker
So that way anybody can see, right.
00:42:33
Speaker
What's going on here.
00:42:34
Speaker
And of course there, that requires like safety, community,
00:42:38
Speaker
and all of those things to take the risk and make that thinking public.
00:42:41
Speaker
But then when it's out there, we can all think on those objects together.
00:42:45
Speaker
And just, I love the concreteness of it.
00:42:49
Speaker
I love the ability then to modify those models and learn as, as we learn and grow together, those models and things are going to change.
00:42:59
Speaker
How have you seen that play out, you know, in, in your own practice?
00:43:03
Speaker
How have you,
00:43:04
Speaker
embodied that idea of pedagogical public documentation.
00:43:09
Speaker
I think it's one of the most powerful things because it helps communicate again, teacher as interpreter of children's thinking, right?
Documenting Children's Thinking: Beyond Right Answers
00:43:18
Speaker
And it moves the parent from my kid understands A, B, and C, which is good.
00:43:27
Speaker
I mean, you need that.
00:43:28
Speaker
That's the parent's job.
00:43:30
Speaker
But
00:43:31
Speaker
that this is the range of thinking, right?
00:43:34
Speaker
And so it helps the parent expand their, their,
00:43:40
Speaker
knowledge of, you know, cause the parent sees one kid, they see one child in isolation or, you know, they have several children so they can see the range.
00:43:49
Speaker
But when you document, uh, you know, multiple children's thinking, especially without saying who said what, because that's also important, you know, you're just giving a framework and saying, well, this is our range of thinking, you know, why do leaves fall off trees?
00:44:08
Speaker
You know, why in the fall, what, why does that occur?
00:44:12
Speaker
And, and then write down and the teacher has to make selections and she's making decisions about which piece of information to, you know, include.
00:44:21
Speaker
And somebody says, well, they just get so tired.
00:44:24
Speaker
They just shake and fall off.
00:44:26
Speaker
They just, they just can't stand it anymore.
00:44:29
Speaker
You know, and, and that's our thinking.
00:44:32
Speaker
Now, a parent might say, well, they're going to tell.
00:44:35
Speaker
They want to fill the information, right?
00:44:37
Speaker
No, this is why it happens.
00:44:39
Speaker
But a lot of people actually don't know why.
00:44:43
Speaker
And so these are the kind of questions.
00:44:47
Speaker
And when you show that thinking and you make that thinking public in some way, it really helps people see the thought process and where children are.
00:45:00
Speaker
in how, you know, in, in the range of their thinking.
00:45:04
Speaker
And so it provides more conceptual frameworks around that rather than, well, this is why leaves fall off.
00:45:12
Speaker
You know, they fall off because of, of the light.
00:45:15
Speaker
That's it.
00:45:16
Speaker
That's the answer.
00:45:17
Speaker
You know, another one is what is the, like, here's what, what is the story of Goldilocks and the three bears trying to teach children?
00:45:27
Speaker
OK, that's a fun one because people assume they know.
00:45:31
Speaker
But when you really start thinking about it, you know, it's an environmentalist dream.
00:45:37
Speaker
That's what the story is about.
00:45:39
Speaker
But I need to go back and reread.
00:45:42
Speaker
I know.
00:45:42
Speaker
Right.
00:45:43
Speaker
But there's these sort of questions like I went to a regio session and they were talking about the the children asked the question, do plants make noise?
00:45:52
Speaker
And then the they documented how the children went about finding out.
00:45:58
Speaker
Do plants make noise?
00:45:59
Speaker
They had stethoscopes and they were listening to the plants.
00:46:03
Speaker
Now you could see the teachers in this room like hearts beating like, oh, my gosh, what are these people doing?
00:46:11
Speaker
Like it was crazy.
00:46:12
Speaker
Right.
00:46:13
Speaker
But, you know, come to find out what plants do make noise.
00:46:16
Speaker
Right.
00:46:17
Speaker
And so, you know, we assume all of these things don't happen or that we know the answer.
00:46:25
Speaker
But it is, again, embracing that curiosity.
00:46:28
Speaker
Well, how are we going to know?
00:46:30
Speaker
How can we find out?
00:46:32
Speaker
What questions can we ask?
00:46:34
Speaker
So it's that approach that is, you know, you're trying to constantly drive at.
00:46:41
Speaker
That's the interesting part.
00:46:44
Speaker
So you do that through documentation and that is giving a picture.
00:46:50
Speaker
It is providing a picture for people of the process of learning.
00:46:54
Speaker
And I think that, you know, you're right.
00:46:56
Speaker
It's the single most, I think, big takeaway.
00:47:00
Speaker
Um,
00:47:00
Speaker
for that is instead of a grade, well, you've achieved an A, you know, you've unlocked the A badge.
00:47:06
Speaker
Well, what does that mean?
00:47:07
Speaker
How much do you really remember of what you, you know, of high school biology or high school, whatever it is you learned, you know, could you pass a test today on that?
00:47:20
Speaker
But when you learn it through organically and through this process, you could, you know,
00:47:28
Speaker
And so I think it's a very interesting switch in terms of how you approach teaching and learning.
00:47:37
Speaker
Yeah, that's such a great example too.
00:47:39
Speaker
Like in the book, you write about compliance versus understanding.
00:47:42
Speaker
And I feel, I think of the kid who, if you ask them, why do leaves fall off trees?
00:47:47
Speaker
They could just like recite an answer, right?
00:47:49
Speaker
That might get them a score on a test, but that doesn't really demonstrate an understanding of the thing.
00:47:54
Speaker
It's almost like,
00:47:55
Speaker
You know, when you think that, you know, then the inquiry process actually stops because you think that you've arrived at some kind of answer.
00:48:02
Speaker
But then maybe you follow that up with a question, you know, to say, like, well, why are there still?
00:48:07
Speaker
Oh, these are these are coniferous trees now.
00:48:09
Speaker
Their their leaves don't do they have leaves?
00:48:12
Speaker
What are these pointy things?
00:48:13
Speaker
Why don't they fall off?
00:48:14
Speaker
Well, then, oh, now we're going to have to instigate this inquiry process now as another.
00:48:20
Speaker
We have to test our schema against all this new information.
00:48:23
Speaker
So it's like really, in this case, like thinking that, you know, is like the enemy of that process of finding out the thing.
00:48:30
Speaker
Well, and exactly.
00:48:31
Speaker
And you don't see this any.
00:48:32
Speaker
There's no better illustration for this than second than than math.
Inquiry-Based Learning in Higher Education: Challenges
00:48:37
Speaker
OK, and it is in borrowing and carrying.
00:48:41
Speaker
Right.
00:48:42
Speaker
And and it is the number one place you'll see it because, you know, we have the new math or whatever you're teaching the concept, right, of tens and ones and hundreds and all the different place values and all of that and breaking down into base 10.
00:49:00
Speaker
OK, things.
00:49:02
Speaker
And then the child takes home the homework.
00:49:05
Speaker
Right.
00:49:05
Speaker
Three hundred and sixteen minus two hundred and eleven.
00:49:10
Speaker
whatever it is.
00:49:11
Speaker
And then the parent says, don't then, then they teach them the algorithm.
00:49:16
Speaker
Don't listen to that.
00:49:17
Speaker
Right.
00:49:18
Speaker
And they say, let me show you how to do it.
00:49:19
Speaker
And they teach the stacking method to the child, mostly because the parent in themselves and teacher, I shouldn't say this because a lot of teachers don't understand it either.
00:49:31
Speaker
They just teach the algorithm because they themselves don't understand actually what they're doing.
00:49:38
Speaker
So then they say, you know, and so it then it just gets passed down and the child then misses the learning.
00:49:46
Speaker
Right.
00:49:46
Speaker
And it is so funny because I when I taught second grade, I'm now back in kindergarten.
00:49:50
Speaker
But when I taught second grade, I would tell parents this.
00:49:53
Speaker
I'm like, you're going to want to teach them this.
00:49:56
Speaker
Don't do it every time.
00:49:58
Speaker
You know, about a third of the class, they would still go home and teach it.
00:50:04
Speaker
And so, but that is a great example of the misunderstanding that occurs in that space between understanding and then the concept.
00:50:16
Speaker
So just what you were saying, yeah.
00:50:20
Speaker
I had something else and it just like went straight out of my brain.
00:50:24
Speaker
So, oh, cause that is just such a, I think that really is like the vital dichotomy, right?
00:50:31
Speaker
To sort of understanding how
00:50:33
Speaker
We arrived at this place in education, especially, you know, as, you know, like the high stakes trickles down into earlier and earlier grade levels, right?
00:50:43
Speaker
The demand that kids know versus the, you know, request, the requirement, I would say, that kids learn to inquire.
00:50:53
Speaker
And I always got frustrated in my practice as a high school teacher when I would try to like reignite project-based learning in my own context, right?
00:51:01
Speaker
An inquiry in a high school classroom because I would have kids, 17, 18-year-old, 16, 17, 18-year-old kids who have never done any of that.
00:51:10
Speaker
And they've entirely forgotten how to do that.
00:51:12
Speaker
And I would say like, guys, really.
00:51:14
Speaker
red alert, right?
00:51:16
Speaker
The rest of your life outside of school is going to be this.
00:51:18
Speaker
You have, you got to do it.
00:51:20
Speaker
And I, I would preface, you know, we'd start the thing by saying, well, let's ask and answer a self-generated question.
00:51:26
Speaker
So what's like, what's something that you want to know that you've never gotten to learn before?
00:51:30
Speaker
What's a problem that you'd like to solve?
00:51:31
Speaker
What's some, some part of the world or community you'd like to connect with?
00:51:35
Speaker
And they'd say, I don't know.
00:51:36
Speaker
I've never been asked to do that before.
00:51:39
Speaker
And I would say, I
00:51:40
Speaker
This is these are kids who should be the best at this in their school career.
00:51:44
Speaker
Right.
00:51:45
Speaker
And all they've done is just know and regurgitate answers.
00:51:48
Speaker
And they know that, too, because they'll tell you that they'll say it's just test and forget, test and forget.
00:51:53
Speaker
I had a lot of kids come back or email me, you know, after they got to college, they say, Covington, the what you what we did in your class is so much like this college class over here that I have to do now.
00:52:03
Speaker
So, you know, hey.
00:52:05
Speaker
Just want to let you know that they're making those connections, right?
00:52:08
Speaker
And I think, I always think what the power would look like if we kept that inquiry mindset from early childhood education, right?
00:52:18
Speaker
If we embedded that there and then just grew that, scaffolded it, right?
00:52:23
Speaker
Imagine what 16, 17, 18 year olds could do if they had
00:52:27
Speaker
12 years of inquiry learning and asking and answering self-generated questions, connecting with the community, managing and organizing projects, right?
00:52:37
Speaker
Like they're going to be the best at that by the time that they hit adulthood when all those other supports, structures and scaffolds fall away.
00:52:44
Speaker
And it says, welcome to the quote unquote real world now, right?
00:52:48
Speaker
Like what if they've just been in that world the whole time?
00:52:50
Speaker
I guess that, again, I'm soapboxing a lot here because this conversation, Heidi, is connecting to so many
00:52:57
Speaker
like key ideas and frustrations about the current system that, you know, I have and that I've experienced on both sides of these things.
00:53:05
Speaker
I hear you.
00:53:07
Speaker
I'm with you.
00:53:08
Speaker
I'm with you.
00:53:09
Speaker
I'm with you.
00:53:11
Speaker
So I guess that is to say, seeing that in, you know, reading that in your work, being able to connect with you in this, and then, you know, to have you help me build a bridge to, you
00:53:22
Speaker
to Reggio and like a whole other world that values and honors that, I'm super appreciative.
00:53:28
Speaker
I'm thankful.
00:53:30
Speaker
And it just, it feels very validating then.
00:53:33
Speaker
And I think our collective mission should be to embed those ideas and provide the supports for those in early childhood education and then make sure, right?
00:53:44
Speaker
Let's just, let's keep that momentum going and build it throughout.
00:53:49
Speaker
In addition to everything that we've talked about, right, obviously the Kinder Chat books must have vital.
00:53:55
Speaker
Read those.
00:53:55
Speaker
Connect with Heidi and the Kinder Chat gang.
00:53:58
Speaker
I think about like how you got into this or the things that you read to inspire you.
00:54:02
Speaker
What resources would you recommend to parents or educators looking to learn about these kinds of methods and practices that we've been talking about?
00:54:11
Speaker
I, you know, I think it's particularly difficult right now to to find things that are reputable.
00:54:20
Speaker
You know, there's so much out there now.
00:54:23
Speaker
It's it's just I think to sift through and find things as a parent.
00:54:28
Speaker
Yeah.
00:54:30
Speaker
You know, there's just, it's just so much information out there that it's hard to know, well, what, what is it that I believe?
00:54:38
Speaker
You know, what is it that I, that I want for my kid?
00:54:43
Speaker
And I think keeping curious and watching your children, observing.
00:54:49
Speaker
So, and, and I think play is primary.
00:54:52
Speaker
So there's a guy, Dr. Peter Gray, he, he's doing some great work with play.
00:54:59
Speaker
And I'm really reading a lot of that.
00:55:02
Speaker
So just to, oh, you know, it's like a rabbit hole.
00:55:05
Speaker
One will lead you to the next, will lead you to the next, will lead you to the next.
00:55:10
Speaker
And you have to find what resonates with you as a parent.
00:55:14
Speaker
But I think the landscape today is extremely, extremely complex.
00:55:20
Speaker
And yet it's very simple.
00:55:22
Speaker
You know, it's this is basic stuff.
00:55:26
Speaker
But it's almost that the most basic things have gotten pushed away.
00:55:33
Speaker
So in terms of just social play, basic social play.
00:55:38
Speaker
And the experience that, you know, because kids are spending more time on the computers and less time interacting to the point where, you know, the computer is now dominating what is what you're supposed to be learning.
00:55:56
Speaker
No, the child should know how to interact with one another.
00:56:01
Speaker
So, you know, just those competing resources are difficult to move through.
00:56:08
Speaker
I'm giving a bad answer to your question because spending more time.
00:56:13
Speaker
We need answers.
00:56:14
Speaker
I know, right?
00:56:15
Speaker
We need concrete answers.
00:56:17
Speaker
Spending more time with each other is, and more time in communities, that is a huge resource right there.
00:56:25
Speaker
So almost less time in isolation, more time with each other, I think is, is actually a big answer.
00:56:37
Speaker
Yeah, that's huge.
00:56:39
Speaker
I speak to myself as a parent, right?
00:56:41
Speaker
Hard to just step back and observe or to let your kids do things.
00:56:45
Speaker
You know, they're in the kitchen, you're, you know, stressed out.
00:56:48
Speaker
They're going to, oh, like what's literally what's the worst that could happen, right?
00:56:51
Speaker
The batch of cookies doesn't come out 100% perfect, right?
00:56:53
Speaker
Or...
00:56:55
Speaker
You know, they put the Lego in the wrong spot and have to take like, you know, give them those low stakes chances to figure things out.
00:57:03
Speaker
They're going to be slow and awkward and clumsy with it.
00:57:05
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:06
Speaker
And I think the only way to really get better at that is through practice, patience, you know, observation.
00:57:12
Speaker
Oh, it's not it's not a good skill that I have is not intervening.
00:57:17
Speaker
I appreciate that.
00:57:18
Speaker
That reminder.
00:57:19
Speaker
What if listeners want to connect with you directly or the KinderChat world?
00:57:25
Speaker
What's the best way for them to do that?
00:57:28
Speaker
Well, we have switched models with the changing of social media.
00:57:34
Speaker
We are now doing I'm on Substack.
00:57:37
Speaker
The KinderChat is a monthly post.
00:57:39
Speaker
We post monthly basically writing prompts.
00:57:44
Speaker
And so you can, it's almost sort of a mail order thing is subscribe there.
00:57:52
Speaker
Uh, our website has tons of resources on it, a library, different, uh, resources and different places you can go and look.
00:58:01
Speaker
Um, what's the URL for that?
00:58:04
Speaker
Uh, it's kinder chat.org.org.
00:58:06
Speaker
Okay.
00:58:07
Speaker
Awesome.
00:58:09
Speaker
Yep.
00:58:09
Speaker
Kinderchat.org.
00:58:11
Speaker
And, um, and then the sub stack is on that.
00:58:14
Speaker
So you can subscribe through, uh, through that.
00:58:18
Speaker
And that comes out monthly.
00:58:20
Speaker
We won't slam you for full of emails.
00:58:23
Speaker
And we were able to connect to arrange this conversation via your blue sky presence.
00:58:28
Speaker
Yes.
00:58:28
Speaker
You want to drop your handle on there?
00:58:30
Speaker
Yes.
00:58:30
Speaker
I don't even know it.
00:58:31
Speaker
I'm like, Oh God, no, no, no.
00:58:33
Speaker
You're probably a checked or not.
00:58:35
Speaker
I don't know.
00:58:38
Speaker
because they have a different, uh, uh, handle, but, um, cause you've got the dot blue skies.
00:58:45
Speaker
Yes.
00:58:46
Speaker
It is H Ektronacht.
00:58:49
Speaker
Yes.
00:58:49
Speaker
But if you search, if you search for your name, it'll, it'll pop up.
00:58:53
Speaker
It'll come up.
00:58:55
Speaker
But that's it.
00:58:55
Speaker
No, that's great.
00:58:57
Speaker
I am so excited.
00:58:58
Speaker
grateful for that we were able to connect.
00:59:01
Speaker
Thank you so much for, again, introducing me into this rabbit hole that I've gone down.
00:59:08
Speaker
Thank you for Kinder Chat and everything else to help keep early childhood education vibrant and full of life and inquiry.
00:59:16
Speaker
And thanks for joining me today for this conversation, Heidi.
00:59:19
Speaker
Well, thank you so much, Nick.
00:59:21
Speaker
I always enjoy your posts and your thinking.
00:59:25
Speaker
And this podcast is amazing.
00:59:27
Speaker
And I appreciate the opportunity to talk with you.
00:59:33
Speaker
Thank you again for listening to our podcast at Human Restoration Project.
00:59:36
Speaker
I hope this conversation leaves you inspired and ready to start making change.
00:59:40
Speaker
If you enjoyed listening, please consider leaving us a review on your favorite podcast player.
00:59:44
Speaker
Plus, find a whole host of free resources, writings, and other podcasts all for free on our website, humanrestorationproject.org.
00:59:51
Speaker
Thank you.