Interactive Live Webinar-Winter Series for Teachers -begins January 28th 2021 -workshop only w/o supplies
Live Webinar: Children + Teachers -Thinking together, listening deeply together as ways of dialogue, relationship, and well-being
Start Date: Thursday January 28th, 2021
5 classes offered bi-weekly on Thursdays (January 28th, February 11, February 25th, March 11th, March 25th 2021)
Time: 6:30 pm-8:00 pm
Course Content
You are invited to join Rosalba Bortolotti of Acorn Collaborative and Tiziana D'Angelo of Stretching Canvas for a 5 session webinar series to explore and investigate the view of the teacher and the child as co-collaborators and co-researchers in the learning process. We will engage in dialogues about the relationship and relations between teachers and children, children to child, children in relation with materials and with environments and spaces. Together we will be digging deeper into pedagogical approaches to learning, well-being, and time. During our current situation, we are challenged to rethink environments and materials, and continue to search for meaningful connections.
This webinar is taking place through a Zoom platform while using materials and reflective practices for well-being.
We look forward to having you join us on this fun and interactive Winter webinar series!
Sessions Details:
- Each live session begins with a brief heart-centered meditation to ground, focus and center ourselves.
- We then move into a Power Point audio visual presentation
- Interactive experience with materials
- Q + A
- Certificates are available
Session 1: January 28th
The relationship with environments, spaces, time and materials: Participants are invited to collaborate on the ideas we will explore on how everyday environments, children, and teachers share and send messages of well being and belonging. How do we really connect and remain fully present with children? How do we listen, observe and be the witness of their play, conversations and in turn offer an environment that becomes the third teacher. An environment that is ever changing as the children change? The environment is also supported in the quality and type of materials we choose together with the children and with keeping the children’s interest at the heart.
In this webinar, the first of the series, listening and observing environments and children will support our learning together alongside the children.
Session 2: February 11th
Paper: In the second of the series, we continue to discuss the importance of the environment and materials, taking a closer look at the way we choose and investigate the qualities of a material, such as paper. Paper as it holds memory of thoughts and representations, paper as it holds the ideas of how it becomes changeable, posing new questions. We hold the ideas of paper as it can become an important tool in the classroom as something three dimensional, transparent, and colourful. It can be used together with a light table, mirrors, and other tools.
With the ability for children and adults to use minds and hands to find ways to represent something new, paper will invite participants to engage in thinking deeply about the properties and encounters with paper.
Session 3: February 25th
Paint: As another media tool, paint can also offer children the opportunity to explore its many properties. In this webinar, participants are invited to delve into the different types of paints we can offer children and how it can be a partner in children’s representation of their theories and ideas. When we offer different types of paints such as watercolours, inks, tempera, or acrylic, we can be mindful in the way it is presented and see how different marks and painting techniques are revealed on various types of paper and surfaces. We want to acknowledge and be aware of how this will support our curriculum planning and support children’s thinking.
Session 4: March 11th
Clay: In this webinar on clay, we will demonstrate and discuss the benefits and properties of this beautiful, natural media. We explore sensorial elements of how clay can be manipulated and transformed (from a wet solid, to liquid, a dry solid, observing it's fragility, what makes it strong, all the way to its powder form) -and how does clay lend an emotional component in the way it is used and through the process of exploring, building, collapsing, destroying and awe in the continuous transformations? Clay is giving, responsive and comforting because it is from the earth. It offers the user many ways to explore, fail and find success through it's hands on use. How can clay support your curriculum? How can it sustain the benefits and importance of its natural and constantly changing state.
Session 5: March 25th
Fibers: Yarns + Fabrics: In the last of this series, fibers will be the connecting piece as we present textures, colours, lengths, widths, thicknesses, strengths, and flexibility of the fiber. How can these connect with the environment? With paper, clay, paint? We will find these ways through our presentation, hands on explorations and discussions during the webinar. It is an opportunity to share the importance of presenting a material into the classroom and into the curriculum.
Our hands, body and senses discover and interpret the fibers and fabrics as it becomes part of a narrative, emotion, a building tool, and a way to connect with other elements.