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Studio of Interactions: A Children’s Course

Date

Place

Garage Kids' Studio

6 sessions

120 minutes

DESCRIPTION

Garage launches a course based on the Reggio Emilia Approach for participants aged 6–8.

Over six sessions children will immerse themselves in the world of artistic research and create their own unique works together with experienced Reggio teacher Alexandra Rusakova. During the course they will study a wide range of themes, from weaving to the delicate balance of ecosystems.

Like individual threads being woven into a single drawing in which each coexists with the other, we will study how people and ecosystems interact by using the Reggio Emilia Approach, which focuses on the collective construction of knowledge and considers that education is a dynamic and joint social process. We will create an environment that supports the exchange of ideas, free self-expression and research, helping children to discover new ways of understanding themselves, other people, and the world around them.

About
the Reggio Emilia
Approach

The Reggio Emilia Approach is an educational philosophy which states that children construct knowledge through the relationships they build with other people and the environment. It suggests that children have access to «100 languages» with which to express their ideas. The aim of the approach is to encourage children to understand the world using various means and use symbolic languages (such as painting, sculpture, and drawing) to construct knowledge together. Materials and methods of research may include observation, analysis, data collection, and recording the results of things that concern children. 

This approach was developed after World War II by teacher Loris Malaguzzi and parents in villages near the city of Reggio Emilia in Italy. It is based on the work of theorists such as Lev Vygotsky, Jean Piaget, Howard Gardner, and Jerome Bruner. 

Reggio teachers see the child as a person with unlimited potential who can interact with the world and make a contribution, as an active participant who constructs their own experience and identity, and as a person with comprehensive rights. Teachers observe children carefully, valuing their ideas and using facilitation methods to direct them toward more detailed study, building hypotheses, and reflection with the help of artistic research. The projects do not have a strict timetable and run at the children’s pace, thus encouraging them to return to areas that interest them. Using various media and time-unlimited projects children receive multiple perspectives and a deeper level of understanding of the themes they are exploring.

Course
Methodologist

 
Elizaveta Kaluzhskaya

A teacher, curator, independent researcher, and former curator and manager of educational and public programs at the State Hermitage Museum and Garage. She graduated from the Philosophy Faculty of St. Petersburg State University, studied as a preschool teacher in London, taught at an accredited Montessori school (London), studied the Reggio Emilia Approach on three Reggio Children courses (London), and completed a psychology program at Birkbeck, University of London.

COURSE TEACHER

 
Alexandra Rusakova

A children’s teacher and psychologist, curator, and methodologist. She graduated in psychology and pedagogics in education from the Russian State University for the Humanities. She studied the Reggio Emilia Approach with Anna Vendik and Elena Smolina. She has worked as a teacher in international preschools in Shanghai and as a senior tutor at the Reggio inspired preschool PLIM! (Moscow). She works as a curator, methodologist, and an adaptive psychologist at the Reggio inspired preschool Reggio Garden (Moscow).

 

How to Take part

Schedule

Getting to Know the Method, the Group, and the Studio

Participants will get to know each other, the teacher, and the space, will learn what will happen during the sessions, and will do creative tasks that will help them better understand each other.

Date
October 26, Saturday
Time
14:00–16:00
Place
Garage Kids' Studio

Weaving and Interweaving

Participants will begin to explore the process of weaving using improvisation and the layering of colored knots and threads. During the process of crossing, thoughts, materials, and ideas combine into a single fabric, underlining the importance of cooperation and interrelationships between participants. 

Date
November 2, Saturday
Time
14:00–16:00
Place
Garage Kids' Studio

Tactile Forest

Continuing the theme of communities, the children will learn how interaction happens in the forest ecosystem and will create a tactile forest made up of plants, mycelium, insects, animals, microorganisms, interwoven roots, and layers. Participants will discuss and create hypotheses about how elements of the forest communicate with each other and the place of people in this ecosystem.

Date
November 9, Saturday
Time
14:00–16:00
Place
Garage Kids' Studio

Transformation of Materials

During the session the group will discuss how every object can have a new life and will create works using recycled materials. Participants will fantasize about how everyday objects could be transformed and whether we need to buy something new when we are surrounded by so many unusual things. 

Date
November 16, Saturday
Time
14:00–16:00
Place
Garage Kids' Studio

Let’s Rename the World!

What if all names were completely wrong and our task was to rename everything? During the session participants will create dictionaries of new words, illustrate them or create collages, study them using the senses, and ask themselves whether their relationship to the objects they named has changed. 

Date
November 23, Saturday
Time
14:00–16:00
Place
Garage Kids' Studio

A Series of Open Instructions

During the session participants will explore different ways of interpreting a text. Using open instructions, we will find points of meeting and separation between our perception of the world and will discuss the value of how, since we are all different, we can enrich the world by creating together. 

Date
November 30, Saturday
Time
14:00–16:00
Place
Garage Kids' Studio

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