How a project starts, and how we know when it ends

Parents sometimes ask what the topic is this term. In the older rooms there often is not one at the start.

It starts with a question that will not go away

A child notices that their shadow is longer in the morning. Two others go and check. By the second day somebody has fetched a torch, and a teacher has quietly put paper and chalk near the window.

That is the whole of the Reggio Emilia part of our curriculum: the teacher does not supply the question, but does supply the next material at the right moment.

It ends when the class stops asking

A project runs for as many weeks as the class stays curious about it, and not one week longer. Stretching it to fill a term is how a project turns into a worksheet.

The end of a project is not a display on the wall. It is the morning nobody goes back to it.

What you see at home

• The same question, asked at dinner for a fortnight.
• Requests for odd materials: torches, mirrors, string.
• A photograph in illumine that finally explains all of it.