4. Reggio Emilia philosophy of teaching and learning science

Reggio Emilia approach is examined and defined here from the perspectives of integrated teaching and learning and 3H principle.

#### 4.1 Integrated teaching and learning

There are many models to integrate curriculum, namely, fragmented, connected, nested, sequenced, shared, webbed, traded, integrated, immersed, and networked model. Each model displays a different type of curriculum, being content oriented and/or single disciplined through process oriented and/or student focused. The integrated curriculum model aims competence in the mean of overall integrated learning competence in math, science, literacy, art/music, and all other discipline domains. Moreover, curriculum integration encourages teachers to take into account children's whole development including cognitive and social development, while integration happens in the program and experiences [10, 11].

In curriculum integration, planning begins with a central topic in Reggio Emilia classrooms and develops through new research experiences (explorations) and theories (children's ideas and hypothesis on how the world works). Children are encouraged to ask questions and addressed to search on their own interests. There is freedom for inquiry, questioning, diverse ideas, and differences. Unlike the separate-subject approach, in integrated curriculum model, there is collaborative planning and conceptual integrity. In the integrated curriculum model, child is in the center (child-centered and child is the one who is questioning), but in Reggio Emilia approach, the child, teacher, and parents are all in the center as being protagonists, and all are questioning [10–13].

Reggio Emilia approach resembles more immersed model because as stated by Fogarty, integration takes place within learners, and immersed learners constantly make connections to the topic of the research. Children control their own learning by choosing the topic which they inquire about and which they are interested in. Teachers constantly observe and collect data about interests of children and then decide what to do next in the planning of the curriculum, just like in Reggio Emilia preschools [3, 10–13].

Charbonneau states that competency is one of the factors that is needed to be "successful." All other factors are understanding the relevancy of what they are learning in the classroom to life in the "real world," applying what they learn to that real world, making their own decisions comfortably and trusting in their own ability to do so, questioning and inquiring thoughtfully and creatively, using problem solving skills, and having realistic and high expectations for their own performance [14]. According to those factors, Reggio Emilia children appear to be competent. Moreover, Charbonneau indicates that formal measurement and evaluation models do not provide enough information about how children think and process concepts and how they assess their own learning. However, Reggio Emilia teachers accomplish that successfully through pedagogical documentation of all protagonists of education including children and the program.
