Children’s Studio: a Novel Approach to Early Childhood Education Practice

Presentation:  Tahmina Shayan

Session C | 10:05 – 10:45 | Location: Room 1003

Abstract:

The children’s studio is a collective space which offers a rich learning context and environment for creating knowledge. The studio is an intentional artistic space where children are accompanied by attuned adults and are given space, time and opportunity as well as a variety of materials to inquire, question, explore, experiment, create, make, unmake, notice, linger, wonder, discover, and invent (Kind, forthcoming). The studio is a place of experimentation which emerges and moves with projects and where the “relationships of body-material-surface-and-space” is living (Pacini-Ketchabaw, Kind & Kocher, 2017, p. 9). The studio is an idea that can take shape anywhere and is not bound to the walls of the rooms or classroom. Studio learning in early childhood education is a new approach. As part of my graduation, I conducted my inquiry project in understanding studio practice and pedagogy at the Capilano University Children’s Studio. This studio is a gathering place for children and educator to come together and collectively inquire, explore, engage, and experiment an idea. The studio is based on projects and it emerges with children’s engagement, theories and stories. The atelierista, artist in residence, designs the studio space in a way that invites children to engage, respond, question and invent. The children are given agency and the freedom to engage with the idea of the studio with their own rhythms. The educators follow a responsive approach by listening thoughtfully to children’s rhythms and ways of working with ideas, materials and space. They follow an inquiry-based and problem solving approach where both educators and children work through the problems they encounter in the studio. This workshop will discuss how the studio space and the materials can invite children to express their ideas, knowledge, theories and stories through many languages such as drawing, music, dance, performative and narrative languages. Moreover, I will discuss how studio as an artistic and emergent space provoke inquiry and call for experimentation and multisensorial engagement. The questions such as what are the implication of studio approach in early childhood education and education will be addressed.
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