Representatives from nine Lower Mainland and Fraser Valley districts came together at Meadowbrook Elementary on November 1, 2017 for our first BCAMT Reggio-Inspired Mathematics collaborative inquiry meeting of this school year.
Each district team brought materials and information to display, to share what they have been doing to enact the goals of this project in their districts or schools. This is the "soft start" to our evening, as educators from all over drive to our meeting location. It gives us a chance to re-connect, make connections, take photographs, pick up handouts and information and get our minds ready for discussion and inquiry.
As there were some educators new to our network joining us, it was important to frame our work and remember the principles upon which our inquiry is based - inspired by the education principles from Reggio Emilia, Italy:
- viewing the child as capable, competent and having rights – that the child has a hundred or more languages to express ideas
- environment as third teacher
- pedagogy of listening
- responsive, emergent curriculum
- socially constructed learning, collaborative
- importance of relationships
We also shared the practices we have drawn from this approach and that have inspired our project:
- the 100 languages of children
- connectedness - culture, community, environment
- the environment as third teacher
- emergent curriculum
- inquiry-based
- loose parts & natural materials
- projects/investigations
- documentation, teacher as researcher - making learning visible
The website from the BC Numeracy Network was shared as a resource and as a pedagogical provocation to think about how the work we are doing together is part of a balanced numeracy approach. Link to website is HERE
We came together to do some thinking around the nuanced differences between the terms rich open tasks, invitations and provocations in mathematics. As we work together on our next publication, the language we use is important and we need to co-construct how we define and use these terms together. Some examples from classrooms were shared to highlight the similarities and differences and to show how playful mathematical routines can support and work in harmony with inquiry-based explorations and investigations.
After dinner together and more time to share and talk with educators from different districts, we worked together in cross-district groups to discuss how districts are focusing on spatial reasoning and to provide suggestions for our latest "four-pager" on pedagogical content knowledge around spatial reasoning. After some final editing, it will be posted soon!
Thank you to everyone for their contributions to this evening.
A special thank you to Harpreet Email, Lauren MacLean and the staff of Meadowbrook Elementary for welcoming us to their school!
~Janice
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