The Language of Art: Inquiry-Based Studio Practices in Early Childhood Settings

Typical art resources for teachers offer discrete art activities, but these don't carry children or teachers into the practice of using the languages of art. This resource offers guidance for teachers to create space, time, and intentional processes for children's exploration and learning to use art for asking questions, offering insights, exploring hypotheses, and examining experiences from unfamiliar perspectives.

Inspired by an approach to teaching and learning born in Reggio Emilia, Italy, The Language of Art, Second Edition, includes:

• A new art exploration for teachers to gain experience before implementing the practice with children
• Advice on setting up a studio space for art and inquiry
• Suggestions on documenting children's developing fluency with art media and its use in inquiry
• Inspiring photographs and ideas to show you how inquiry-based practices can work in any early childhood setting

Ann Pelo is a teacher educator, program consultant, and author whose primary work focuses on reflective pedagogical practice, social justice and ecological teaching and learning and the art of mentoring. Currently, Pelo consults early childhood educators and administrators in North America, Australia, and New Zealand on inquiry-based teaching and learning, pedagogical leadership, and the necessary place of ecological identity in children's—and adults'—lives. She is the author of several books including the first edition of The Language of Art and co-author of Rethinking Early Childhood Education.

• StoryMaking: The Maker Movement Approach to Literacy for Early Learners
• Loose Parts 3: Inspiring Culturally Sustainable Environments (Loose Parts Series)
• Loose Parts: Inspiring Play in Young Children (Loose Parts Series)
• Wonder Art Workshop: Creative Child-Led Experiences for Nurturing Imagination, Curiosity, and a Love of Learning
• Working in the Reggio Way: A Beginner's Guide for American Teachers
• The Art of Awareness, Second Edition: How Observation Can Transform Your Teaching (NONE)
• Learning Together with Young Children, Second Edition: A Curriculum Framework for Reflective Teachers
• The Hundred Languages of Children: The Reggio Emilia Experience in Transformation, 3rd Edition
• In the Spirit of the Studio: Learning from the Atelier of Reggio Emilia (Early Childhood Education Series)
• Reggio-Inspired Mathematics