Project Shiro

Hi, I'm Sumire Iikawa from Japan. I'm a pedagogical consultant based in London and Tokyo. My approach to early years education has two significant backgrounds. Education through Environment - one of the Japanese early years principles and Pedagogy of Listening - established in Reggio Emilia-Approach. They are naturally intertwined with my personal and professional values.Project Shiro is a journey towards appreciation and celebration. This project aims to empower individual professionals and teams of educators to be grateful for who we are, where we are and what we have around us.

What is Project Shiro?

This Kanji means 'white' in Japanese, and it is pronounced 'Shiro'. As a colour of celebration in many cultures, this project reminds us to be grateful for ordinary days and appreciate the provisionality of life.There are hundreds of different whites in the world around us. What is your favourite white? How do you feel when thinking of that white?

Rainbow makes Shiro

White to me also means a mixture of illuminated colours. This metaphor emphasises children's competency. Young children bring their colour to the relationship and the layers of their lights create 'white'. In this way, 'white' represents collaboration and knowledge construction.Project Shiro supports educators' re-conceptualisation of materials and pedagogical documentation, to enhance relationships and collaboration with/among children.What do you think of democratic culture in early childhood education? How would you like to work together with children, team and families?

Materials

Materials play a key role as creative mediums of thinking, communicating and meaning-making.Project Shiro offers on-site workshops for a group of educators on loose parts, clay, graphics and light & digital.During the workshop, materials talk to us, we will listen to their questions with eyes and think with hands.This slow space will encourage us to re-search the possibilities and intelligence of materials around us everyday.Work together further? Project Shiro will happily accompany your journey with children, proposing pedagogical documentation cycle for joint reflections online/ on-site.

Pedagogical Documentation

Would you like to celebrate the daily lives of children and value their experiences?
Are you looking for ways to interpret children's experiences from multiple perspectives?
Is your team in search of deepening everyday research with groups of children?We can start conversations with pedagogical documentation. Having lively experiences of children at heart, we will discover:

  • Why documentation?

  • What is documentation?

  • How do we use documentation?

How it works?

  1. Book your online consultation through the form. - Learn together

  2. Online or in-person consultation. What is your situation? How can we work together?

  3. Online meeting. Discuss initial plan (price and schedules included).

  4. Workshop/ reflection/ online sessions begins!

  5. Your independent journey continues. Let's keep in touch and we learn together!

Would you like to learn together?

You are more than welcome to provide feedback or ask any questions.

Project Shiro is informed by theory and practice. The project itself is evolving between research and praxis.
We are sensitive to making respectful and ethical choices in collaboration with you all.

  • Carolyn Edwards, Lella Gandini, G. Forman. (Ed.). (2012). The hundred languages of children : the Reggio Emilia approach, advanced reflections (3rd ed.). Ablex.

  • Clark, A. (2022). Slow Knowledge and the Unhurried Child: Time for Slow Pedagogies in Early Childhood Education (1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003051626

  • Giamminuti, S., Cagliari, P., Giudici, C., & Strozzi, P. (2023). The Role of the Pedagogista in Reggio Emilia: Voices and Ideas for a Dialectic Educational Experience (1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003181026

  • Moss, P. (2019). Alternative Narratives in Early Childhood: An Introduction for Students and Practitioners. Oxford: Routledge.https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315265247

  • Rinaldi, C. (2021). In Dialogue with Reggio Emilia: Listening, Researching and Learning (2nd ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780367854539

  • Rogoff, B. (2003). The cultural nature of human development / Barbara Rogoff. Oxford : Oxford UP. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203317730

  • Saeki, Y. (2023). 子どもの遊びを考える: 「いいこと思いついた!」から見えてくること. 北大路書房.

  • Sousa, D., & Moss, P. (2024). From anger to dreaming to real utopias: Re-thinking, re-conceptualising and re-forming (early childhood) education in the conditions of the times. Global Studies of Childhood, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/20436106241267781

© 2024 Project Shiro.