School Play: Education for Life
COSBY STEELE ROGERS and SATOMI IZUMI TAYLOR
Societal changes in modes of entertainment, hurried adult schedules, the lack of safe outdoor play spaces and increased academic pressures on educators and children all contribute to the demise of children’s opportunity to develp the whole self through play. Research has documented the importance of play for cognition, creativity, moral development and emotional well being. This article draws upon the theories of Piaget and Vygotsky to mechanisms through which play enhances development. The article differentiates between free play and the playful curriculum. Free play is under the control of the child and is importantfor social, moral and emotinal development thus underscoring the importance of recess. The principles are described for developing playful curricula to implement standards of learning by focusing on the context and dispositions of play.
COSBY STEELE ROGERS is Associate Professor in the Department of Human Development at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. SATOMI IZUMI TAYLOR is Associate Professor in the Department of Instruction and Curriculum Leadership at the University of Memphis.
Sharing, Discovering, and Creating: Practice into Theory and Theory into Practice
LYNDA D. STONE
This article suggests that teacher’s identities are socially constructed as competent in practical knowledge but not in formal theorectical knowledge about teaching and learning. It is argued that the social and historical distinction between theory and practice has also contributed to teachers’ identities as primarily practical. This identity has limited teachers’ development and deeper understandings of the relationship between teaching practices and educational theory. A transformation of teachers’ identities from solely practioners into teacher-researchers is offered as a means to promote better understandings of the reciprocal relationship between theory and practice. Teacher-researchers have the potential to redefine research questions and influence educational theory. An expample of a university and elementary school collaboration is given and shows that instructional practices and formal theories are in a reciprocal relationship.
LYNDA D. STONE is Assistant Professor of Childhood Development at California State University, Sacramento
Multiple Embedded Scaffolds: Supporting English Learners’ Social/Affective, linguistic and Academic Development in Kindergarten
SUZANNE F. PEREGOY and OWEN F. BOYLE
This article provides a synthesis of language education research and practice pertinent to teaching English learners in kindergarten. Three majoy goals are highlighted: social/affective adjustment, English language development and content learning appropriate to children’s age and grade level. A review is provided of theory and research on second language acquisition i English Language Development (ELD) programs, including the concepts of comprehensible input, social interaction and scaffonding. Scaffolding is discussed, introducing the concept of multiple embedded scaffolds, strategies that teachers simultaneously embed in classroom events to support English learners’ comprehension, participation and learning even though children’s proficiency in English is still limited. Detailed classroom examples are provided in which teachers use multiple embedded scaffolds during opening activities for clerical, amnagerial and curricular purposes. the article concludes that when teachers apply multiple embedded scaffolds during routines such as opening activities, they promote socal/affective adjustment, English language development and content learning appropriate to kindergarten.
SUZANNE F. PEREGOY is Professor of Elementary Education at San Francisco State University. OWEN F. BOYLE is Professor of Teacher Education at San Jose State University.
The Educational Roots of Garden-based Instruction and Contemporary Gateways to Gardening with Children
ARLENE MATURANO
California is the first state to announce an initiative creating gardens at every school by the year 2003. However, school gardens have a long tradition. the writing of six educational theorists, Comenius, Rousseau, Pestalozzi, Froebel, Dewey and Montessori, are examined here. Numerous gateways to gardening as a context for learning are suggested.
ARLENE MATURANO is Coordinator of the South Carolina Garden-based Learning Network, 3416 Rawlinson Road, Columbia, S.C. 29209.
