Table of Contents

List of Figures Acknowledgments Chapter 1. Thinking With Materials Eventful Material Relations Materials in Early Childhood The "Material Encounters in Early Childhood Education" Project Inquiring into materiality Experimentation The arts as mode of inquiry The studio Encounters With Materials and the Reggio Emilia projects Inviting conversations through images Diffraction as a Mode of Inquiry Diffracting with concepts This Book's Entanglements with Paper, Charcoal, Paint, Clay, and Blocks Chapter 2. Paper: Movement Singularity The Movements of Making Continuous Motion Caught in the Currents Surprise Movement Across Paper in its Final Move Chapter 3. Charcoal: Encounter To Meet To Touch To Attend To Open To Respond Chapter 4. Paint: Assemblage Improvising Emerging Blending and Bleeding Assembling Creating Chapter 5. Clay: Ecologies Clay in the atrium studio Clay in the forest Clay at the river Meso and Ethoecology Attachments It Matters Fostering and Nourishing Folding In Ecologies of Practice Chapter 6. Blocks: Time The Weight of Time Playing with Time Time as Lived Time as Intensity Transitory Spaces Afterword: Noticing References Index

About the Author

Veronica Pacini-Ketchabaw is Professor of Early Childhood Education in the Faculty of Education at Western University, Canada. Sylvia Kind is Faculty Instructor, Department of Early Childhood Care and Education at Capilano University, Canada, and Adjunct Assistant Professor, Faculty of Graduate Studies at the University of Victoria, Canada. Laurie L.M. Kocher is Faculty Instructor, Department of Early Childhood Care and Education at Capilano University, Canada.

Reviews

"Through vivid vignettes and extensive theoretical grounding, readers are challenged to reconsider taken-for-granted assumptions about the role of materials in the early childhood classroom. This groundbreaking, deeply layered book will remain important to me as I revisit and reflect on its ideas, and I highly recommend it as a must-read for educators in the disciplines of both art education and early childhood education." --Pat Tarr, PhD, retired art and early childhood educator, Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, Canada "'What if...?' This essential question propels this open-ended exploration of the ways that young children and responsive materials interact in early childhood classrooms. The authors invite us to ponder with them, to notice, to question, in ways that move us beyond the conventions and constraints of traditional practices and provisions for young children. Sometimes startling, always provocative, this text rewards careful and considerate reading, as it reminds us how often we tend to structure even the most 'unstructured' aspects of early childhood curriculum, prohibiting truly productive encounters between children and the 'stuff' that offers unknown possibilities." --Christine Marme Thompson, Professor of Art Education, Pennsylvania State University, USA