1. Enhancement
of Children's Learning
Documentation can contribute to the extensiveness and depth of children's
learning from their projects and other work. As Loris Malaguzzi
points out, through documentation children "become even more
curious, interested, and confident as they contemplate the meaning
of what they have achieved" (Malaguzzi,
1993, p. 63). The processes of preparing and displaying documentaries
of the children's experience and effort provides a kind of debriefing
or re-visiting of experience during which new understandings can
be clarified, deepened, and strengthened. Observation of the children
in Reggio Emilia pre-primary classes indicates that children also
learn from and are stimulated by each other's work in ways made
visible through the documents displayed.
The documentation of the children's ideas, thoughts, feelings, and reports are also available to the children to record, preserve, and stimulate their memories of significant experiences, thereby further enhancing their learning related to the topics investigated. In addition, a display documenting the work of one child or of a group often encourages other children to become involved in a new topic and to adopt a representational technique they might use. For example, Susan and Leroy had just done a survey of which grocery stores in town are patronized by the families of their classmates. When Susan wanted to make a graph of her data, she asked Jeff about the graph displayed of his survey about the kinds of cereal their class ate for breakfast. With adult encouragement, children can be resourceful in seeking the advice of classmates when they know about the work done by the other children throughout the stages of a project.
2. Taking
Children's Ideas and Work Seriously
Careful and attractive documentary displays can convey to children
that their efforts, intentions, and ideas are taken seriously. These
displays are not intended primarily to serve decorative or show-off
purposes. For example, an important element in the project approach
is the preparation of documents for display by which one group of
children can let others in the class working on other aspects of
the topic learn of their experience and findings. Taking children's
work seriously in this way encourages in them the disposition to
approach their work responsibly, with energy and commitment, showing
both delight and satisfaction in the processes and the results.
3. Teacher
Planning and Evaluation with Children
One of the most salient features of project work is continuous planning
based on the evaluation of work as it progresses. As the children
undertake complex individual or small group collaborative tasks
over a period of several days or weeks, the teachers examine the
work each day and discuss with the children their ideas and the
possibilities of new options for the following days. Planning decisions
can be made on the basis of what individual or groups of children
have found interesting, stimulating, puzzling, or challenging.
For example, in an early childhood center where the teachers engage weekly – and often daily as well – in review of children's work, they plan activities for the following week collaboratively, based in part on their review. Experiences and activities are not planned too far in advance, so that new strands of work can emerge and be documented. At the end of the morning or of the school day, when the children are no longer present, teachers can reflect on the work in progress and the discussion which surrounded it, and consider possible new directions the work might take and what suggestions might support the work. They can also become aware of the participation and development of each individual child. This awareness enables the teacher to optimize the children's chances of representing their ideas in interesting and satisfying ways. When teachers and children plan together with openness to each other's ideas, the activity is likely to be undertaken with greater interest and representational skill than if the child had planned alone, or the teacher had been unaware of the challenge facing the child. The documentation provides a kind of ongoing planning and evaluation that can be done by the team of adults who work with the children.
4. Parent
Appreciation and Participation
Documentation makes it possible for parents to become intimately
and deeply aware of their children's experience in the school. As
Malaguzzi points out, documentation "introduces parents to
a quality of knowing that tangibly changes their expectations. They
reexamine their assumptions about their parenting roles and their
views about the experience their children are living, and take a
new and more inquisitive approach toward the whole school experience"
(Malaguzzi, 1993, p. 64).
Parents' comments on children's work can also contribute to the value of documentation. Through learning about the work in which their children are engaged, parents may be able to contribute ideas for field experiences which the teachers may not have thought of, especially when parents can offer practical help in gaining access to a field site or relevant expert. In one classroom a parent brought in a turkey from her uncle's farm after she learned that the teacher was helping the children grasp what a real live turkey looked like.
The opportunity to examine the documentation of a project in progress can also help parents to think of ways they might contribute their time and energy in their child's classroom. There are many ways parents can be involved: listening to children's intentions, helping them find the materials they need, making suggestions, helping children write their ideas, offering assistance in finding and reading books, and measuring or counting things in the context of the project.
5. Teacher
Research and Process Awareness
Documentation is an important kind of teacher research, sharpening
and focusing teachers' attention on children's plans and understandings
and on their own role in children's experiences. As teachers examine
the children's work and prepare the documentation of it, their own
understanding of children's development and insight into their learning
is deepened in ways not likely to occur from inspecting test results.
Documentation provides a basis for the modification and adjustment
of teaching strategies, and a source of ideas for new strategies,
while deepening teachers' awareness of each child's progress. On
the basis of the rich data made available through documentation,
teachers are able to make informed decisions about appropriate ways
to support each child's development and learning.
The final product of a child's hard work rarely makes possible an appreciation of the false starts and persistent efforts entailed in the work. By examining the documented steps taken by children during their investigations and representational work, teachers and parents can appreciate the uniqueness of each child's construction of his or her experience, and the ways group efforts contribute to their learning.
6. Children's
Learning Made Visible
Of particular relevance to American educators, documentation provides
information about children's learning and progress that cannot be
demonstrated by the formal standardized tests and checklists we
commonly employ. While U.S. teachers often gain important information
and insight from their own first-hand observations of children,
documentation of the children's work in a wide variety of media
provides compelling public evidence of the intellectual powers of
young children that is not available in any other way that we know
of.
Conclusion
The powerful contribution of documentation in these six ways is possible because children are engaged in absorbing, complex, interesting projects worthy of documentation. If, as is common in many traditional classrooms around the world, a large proportion of children's time is devoted to making the same pictures with the same materials about the same topic on the same day in the same way, there would be little to document which would intrigue parents and provide rich content for teacher-parent or child-parent discussion!
For More Information
Gandini, L. (1993). Educational and Caring Spaces. In C. Edwards, L. Gandini, and G. Forman, The Hundred Languages of Children: The Reggio Emilia Approach to Early Childhood Education. Norwood, NJ: Ablex. ED 355 034.
Katz, L. G. (1995). Talks with Teachers of Young Children: A Collection. Norwood, NJ: Ablex. ED 380 232.
Katz, L. G., and S.C. Chard. (1989). Engaging Children's Minds: The Project Approach. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Katz, L. G., and B. Cesarone, Eds. (1994). Reflections on the Reggio Emilia Approach. Urbana, IL: ERIC Clearinghouse on Elementary and Early Childhood Education. ED 375 986.
Malaguzzi, L. (1993). History, Ideas, and Basic Philosophy. In C. Edwards, L. Gandini, and G. Forman, The Hundred Languages of Children: The Reggio Emilia Approach to Early Childhood Education. Norwood, NJ: Ablex. ED 355 034.
Rabitti, G. (1992). Preschool at "La Villetta." Unpublished Master of Arts thesis, University of Illinois, Urbana.
