Rome - ED250 - Constructing Childhood
BLOCK 5 - SPRING 2027
ED250: Constructing Childhood
ROME, ITALY
In this course, we will focus on examining the ways in which Montessori, Reggio Emilia, and Waldorf (Steiner) pedagogical models position “the child.” By traveling to Italy, we will explore the histories of the development of these models, as well as how they exist and are promulgated in their contemporary forms. The culminating project of the course, and the reason we are studying outside of the United States, is to position a window to-, a mirror of-, and a magnifying glass onto the ways in which the spirit of these pedagogical models has been interpreted in neoliberal, American schooling to construct a child that is white, non-disabled, and middle to upper middle class. We hope to surface, interrogate, and disrupt constructions of the child in liberal, progressive schooling spaces away from practices that continue to marginalize students of Color with and without disabilities and from working class families, and instead to examine if and how these models can be inclusive and beneficiary to all children in the midst of neoliberal school reform.
Course led by Prof. Nickie Coomer and Prof. Tina Valtierra