Classroom teacher Keri Woolsey describes her response: The teachers know the finding has sparked the childrenвЂ™s curiosity when the children ask to photograph the web. Several 4-year-olds discover the strands reflecting the sunlight on a fence post. For example, teachers notice in early autumn that the children are taking an interest in spider webs on the playground. Her numerous publications include writings on early childhood education and folklore, and she is coauthor or coeditor of such works as Insights and Inspirations From Reggio Emilia: Stories of Teachers and Children From North AmericaВ and The Hundred Languages of Children: The Reggio Emilia Approach to Early Childhood Education.В It is through our friendship with Lella Gandini that we have implemented strategies that empower teachers to use space and materials to ignite learning. Lella Gandini is best known in North America as the leading advocate for the Reggio Emilia approach to early childhood education. Inspired by the writings of Lella Gandini, we began a fond relationship with the author and educator, inviting Gandini to visit our school with regularity. To foster such an environment, teachers must go deeper than what is merely seen at eye level and develop a deep understanding of the underlying principles and of childrenвЂ™s thinking, questions, and curiosities.ДЄ little more than a decade ago, Pinnacle Presbyterian Preschool, in Scottsdale, Arizona, began implementing a program directly influenced by the schools of Reggio Emilia. Moreover, the classroom environment can help shape a childвЂ™s identity as a powerful player in his or her own life and the lives of others. Fostering creativity through the work of young hands manipulating objects or making art, it is an environment that reflects the values we want to communicate to children. MalaguzziвЂ™s third teacher is a flexible environment, responsive to the need for teachers and children to create learning together. So important was this notion, that Malaguzzi defined the environment as the third teacher (Gandini 2011). He emphasized that the environment plays a central role in the process of making learning meaningful. Much like Vygotzky, Malaguzzi believed that social learning preceded cognitive development (Gandini 2012). As such, at the core of the Reggio Emilia philosophy is its emphasis on building and sustaining relationships. Malaguzzi emphasized that вЂњit was not so much that we need to think of the child who develops himself by himself but rather of a child who develops himself interacting and developing with othersвЂќ (Rankin 2004, 82). His philosophy-a blend of theory and practice that challenges educators to see children as competent and capable learners in the context of group work (Fraser & Gestwicki 2002)-differs from the widely accepted Piagetian perspective that views child development as largely internal and occurring in stages (Mooney 2013). Malaguzzi passed away two decades ago, but we hope he would be pleased with the progress early childhood educators in North America have made toward understanding his pedagogical lessons. The author of these words, Loris Malaguzzi, was the founder and director of the renowned municipal preschools of Reggio Emilia, Italy. Loris Malaguzzi,В The Hundred Languages of Children What children learn does not follow as an automatic result from what is taught, rather, it is in large part due to the childrenвЂ™s own doing, as a consequence of their activities and our resources.

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