The Center for Children's Learning

Professional Development Opportunities for 2010

2010 Opal School Summer Symposium:

Opal School Workshops:

Visitation Days, Feb. 24-25, 2010: Visit the Opal School classrooms to observe inquiry-based learning through the arts and sciences. Hear from Opal School staff on approaches that invite playful inquiry into the classroom to challenge and engage young minds. Exchange ideas about the practice that holds a strong image of children as thinkers, planners, and contributors to the wider community.

Social & Emotional Intelligences of Children, April 7, 2010: What does it look/sound like when schools support the social and emotional intelligences of children and families? What does the current research tell us about the connections between social/emotional growth and learning? Learn how environments, materials and the arts play vital roles from Opal School educators.

Click here for registration form

Learning Through the Arts: This series of workshops introduces ways of slowing children down to think, communicate and express their ideas through the arts.

Language of Paper: March 16, 2010

Language of Clay: April 13, 2010

Click here for registration form

For almost a decade, the Museum's Opal School staff have listened, observed and documented the natural learning strategies of children. Over the years, workshops, visitation days, the Opal Summer Symposium and materials have been produced to share this valuable information with local, national and international education professionals.

In 2008, the Center for Children's Learning was created to formally continue and expand this research. The purpose of the Center for Children’s Learning is to make visible the way children imagine, design, invent and create using tools of the arts and sciences.

Questions that inspire our work:

• What provokes curiosity in a child?
• How does playful inquiry support children to wonder, imagine and create?
• How do we strengthen the connection between literacy and the arts?
• How can environments provoke and support the creative capacity of children?

For Center publications and videos, download an order form.

Questions? Email or call Center Director Judy Graves at 503-471-9919.