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Gillian Dowley McNamee Biography

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“Well into my teaching career, I learned that good and bad play are usually a matter of having a script that works or one that needs to be rewritten. Once you begin to depend on storytelling and story acting, you start looking at your classrooms as theater. The children are constantly imagining characters and plots and, when they have a chance, with each other, acting out little stories. You can look at the children and yourself as actors. "Well, this hasn't worked. We'd better think of a better way to pretend this story." What seems to be a chaotic scene, one we might call bad play, is simply a scene that lacks closure for one or more characters. The teacher's role is to help the children make up a new scene. The children become used to the teachers - or even other children - saying, "This isn't working. We need to tell the story of what were doing with each other. What characters are we playing? And what needs to be played in a different way so that the play does not have to stop?" (via a Meghan Dombrick-Green interview with Vivian Paley 2001)”

TeachingPedagogyPreschoolEarly EducationVivian Paley
Book:The High-Performing Preschool: Story Acting in Head Start Classrooms
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“What if upon entering the classroom, children find teachers listening attentively for their questions and stories, demonstrating a willingness to engage them in "playing out" their ideas using classroom materials while their propensity to ask questions is at its peak? What if well-educated teachers are guiding children to observe, discuss, imagine, and debate possibilities in the company of their equally eager peers? Our youngest children could,be in such conservatories of educational excellence in our public stools, preparing for their future in school and beyond.”

TeachingYoung ChildrenEarly ChildhoodPedagogyPreschool
Book:The High-Performing Preschool: Story Acting in Head Start Classrooms
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