KORCOS 2017

This one hour workshop provides hands-on strategies for infusing learning and teaching in early and primary classrooms with choice, wonder, and delight. Three guiding questions will be explored:
When and how do we provide opportunities for students to demonstrate choice, set goals, develop and share ideas, make and change rules, and negotiate challenges?
How do we evoke a sense of wonder experienced through playful encounters with materials, ideas, music, languages, stories, movement or other modalities? 
How do we ensure students experience feelings of delight including joy, inspiration, pride, and belonging?

Early childhood education has been Anne van Dam's passion for more than 20 years. She has worked alongside children and educators in schools in Rotterdam, Shanghai, Singapore and Switzerland. She has been an IB trainer since 2005, sharing her passion for young children with educators in IB schools in South East Asia, Europe, Middle East and Africa. She joined EtonHouse International Pre-School in August 2007, drawn to the school for its vision to establish early childhood education centered on young children’s competencies in making meaning and building relationships. At EtonHouse, she combined teaching with the responsibilities of the PYP coordinator. In June 2008, she became the Director of this school. In August 2011, she moved back to Europe and took on the responsibility of Assistant Principal at the International School of Zug and Luzern. At ISZL, she has developed, in partnership with teachers and other school leaders, a vision for the early years programme at the school. This direction places a strong emphasis on relationships, play, learning spaces (both inside and outside) and on making learning and teaching visible to others. A move back to the Netherlands in 2015 has given her the opportunity to work with the PYP development team at the IB regional office in The Hague. She also collaborates with schools as an independent educational consultant.