This special three-volume bundle of Innovations offers a thoughtful and wide-ranging exploration of early childhood education through the lens of the Reggio Emilia Approach, with a focus on thresholds as spaces of connection, transformation, and renewed perspective. This volume also marks NAREA's 20th anniversary, celebrated with a new visual design for the journal. Numbers 1 and 2 build on the shared theme "Stepping Through Thresholds," while Number 3 marks the sixth peer-reviewed issue of Innovations, illuminating how relationships, documentation, and reflection help educators and children cross into new ways of thinking and being together.
Number 1 explores thresholds as intersections that create connection and relationship, opening with a tribute to Lella Gandini and her decades-long role bridging educators in Reggio Emilia and North America on the 60th anniversary of that relationship. It features a study from Bright Start Child Development Center in Santa Barbara on children's movement and meaning-making in nature, ongoing research on Children and Trees in Relationship, and a reflection on the 3rd NAREA Fall Conference in Vancouver, which included a welcome from Musqueam Nation Elder Larry Grant and the Mosaic of Marks, Words, Material exhibition.
Number 2 continues the inquiry into thresholds as spaces of transformation and renewed awareness. It includes a special feature from the Fondazione Reggio Children on quality education as a global and democratic right, a project on family traditions from Velma Thomas Early Childhood Center in Chicago, and a reflection on visual documentation and live streaming from an educator in New York City. This issue also honors longtime NAREA friend Carol Bersani and reflects on the 14th NAREA Winter Conference in Toronto, closing with an invitation to contribute to the 2024 peer-reviewed issue.
Number 3, a peer-reviewed issue, takes up the theme "Committing to an Image of the Child That Resists the Gravitational Pull to 'Get Back to Normal.'" Written in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, it asks what educators learned about their image of the child and what is worth carrying forward rather than simply returning to. Two peer-reviewed articles explore courtesy agreements and kindness at The Cyert Center for Early Education and the practice of listening drawn from a classroom's research on an amaryllis bulb at the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools. The issue closes with reflections on the 19th NAREA Summer Conference, "Crossing Borders: Affirming Rights," in Atlanta.
Together, these three volumes offer educators, researchers, and advocates a rich look into how the Reggio Emilia philosophy supports relational, reflective, and transformative practice. This bundle is ideal for anyone seeking to deepen their understanding of thresholds, image of the child, and the power of connection in early childhood contexts.
