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  • About Us
    • Teaching Preschool Partners believes in co-creation with our partners, and that our partners are a wellspring of inspiration and wisdom. We do not subscribe to conventional ideas of the “expert.” Learn more about how we work!

      • Our Team
      • Our Approach
      • Our Board of Directors
      • Connect
      • Contact Us
      • Follow us on Social Media
      • Join our Email List
  • Programs & Partners
    • We cherish our partnerships and acknowledge the boldness of what our partners are doing. They are creating worlds for children that build on their capabilities and gifts, and upholding a vision of a transformed public education system. Get to know our partners and arrange for a visit!

      • Events
      • 2026 Summer Early Learning Conference
      • 2026 Virtual Professional Learning
      • Past Conferences
      • Teaching Preschools
      • Parkrose School District
      • Gladstone School District
      • Public School District Partners
      • Beaverton School District
      • Greater Albany Public School District
      • North Clackamas School District
      • Portland Public Schools
      • Regional Partnerships
      • Southern Oregon Cohort
      • North Coast Community Page
      • Active Playful Learning
      • About the Project
      • See Our Press Release
  • Classroom Resources
    • This resource library was created with educators in mind. It includes tools and stories from TPP collaborating classrooms and Opal School. We hope you’ll explore these resources to find inspiration, get curious, and imagine next steps for your work with children. This is for you.

      • Resource Library
      • All Resources
      • Documenting Learning
      • Opal SchoolNew
      • About Opal School
      • Opal School Online Archive
      • Collections
      • New to Playful Inquiry?
      • Environments and Materials
      • Tools and Publications
      • See All
      • Store
      • Invitation to Explore
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      • Habits of Mind Posters
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Come see what we are up to! From inspirations for practice to insights into how we work.

teachingpreschoolpartners

We help districts grow strong early learning, create demonstration teaching preschools, and give visibility to genius of children. PreK to Elementary.


The fourth goal of Anti-Bias Education is Activism
The fourth goal of Anti-Bias Education is Activism.

Children want to make sense of the world around them, and they also want to participate in shaping it. After noticing unfairness and talking about its impact, children begin to imagine what could be different: What can we do? How can we help? 

Activism in early childhood often lives in small everyday moments: standing up for a friend, including someone in play, speaking up when something feels hurtful, working together to care for the classroom and community. These moments matter, and they help children experience themselves as capable, caring members of a group whose actions can make a difference.

Classroom invitations can support this thinking:
What could we change?
What would make this more fair?
How can we care for each other?

This post is part of our series exploring the four goals of Anti-Bias Education: Identity, Diversity, Justice and Activism

#antibiaseducation #invitations #opalschool


Exciting news: This year, we’re sharing something
Exciting news: This year, we’re sharing something new at the conference, our new TPP curriculum resource, Invitation to Explore.

Rooted in open-ended materials, playful inquiry, and thoughtful provocation, this resource is designed to support educators in creating meaningful invitations that center children’s thinking and curiosity.
As part of our launch, conference participants can add Invitation to Explore to their registration at a special 20% discount ($40) through June 1st.

Available exclusively to conference attendees (for now).

More details and registration at the link in bio, we can’t wait to share this with you! 

#EarlyChildhoodEducation #EarlyLearningConference 
#EarlyLearningConference #EarlyChildhoodEducation


Inspired by the book Not a Box, children explored
Inspired by the book Not a Box, children explored how something as simple as a box can become… anything. 
When we invite children to move beyond the “right” answer, we open space for imagination, storytelling, and possibility!
These small moments remind us: materials don’t have to be complicated to be meaningful, just open enough to become something new.

#InspiringInventiveness #TeachingForThinking #EarlyChildhoodEducation


What else can it be? Sparking children's curiosity
What else can it be? Sparking children's curiosity and imagination through looking at everyday items through a new lens. These are not just what children see or use everyday; it can also be something new or different. Children benefit from looking beyond the “right” answer to predict many possiblities tickling their imaginations.

Link in bio for the full guide.

This and other resources were preserved at opalschool.org thanks to generous support from James F. and Marion L. Miller Foundation

#InspiringInventiveness #TeachingForThinking #EarlyChildhoodEducation


We’re continuing our Conversations in Early Childh
We’re continuing our Conversations in Early Childhood series with Katie Statman-Weil.

In this conversation, Katie reflects on what it means to support children (and ourselves) in times of stress through attunement, regulation, and the small, everyday moments that shape how children feel in their bodies and in community. From noticing our own internal cues to creating classroom environments that offer rhythm, predictability, and connection, she reminds us of the powerful role educators play in helping children feel seen, understood, and safe.

Read the full interview on our website - link in bio!

We’re also honored to have Katie as our keynote speaker at this year’s conference. Registration is now open!


The Studio is a space in many Reggio inspired earl
The Studio is a space in many Reggio inspired early childhood classrooms facilitated by an adult alongside children. It offers a place and opportunity for children to "speak" the languages of the visual arts. It is designed to "...support the rights of all children, including children with special needs, special rights and dual language learners..." by offering additional ways of expressing oneself. It is a place alive with the 100 Languages of children where children communicate their thinking and feelings. 

To learn more about "The Studio" read our Playful Inquiry in the Early Years Field Guide! See the link in our bio for information on how to purchase.

#reggiochildren


As educators we are navigating a world filled with
As educators we are navigating a world filled with violent images and we make choices everyday of how to be with young children in that world. In our recent interview with John Nimmo he reminded us that children aren't responsible for that world. He leaned on what we learned from Reggio visionaries like Loris Malaguzzi, Vea Vecchi and Carlina Rinaldi who also lived at such a time. "After WWII... The (Reggio) schools were founded by communities responding to fascism. Under fascism there was a very specific image of the child: children were expected to be compliant, to serve the state. The founders of the Reggio schools had a very different image of the child. They saw children as citizens with rights—rights to contribute, rights to beautiful environments, rights to respectful education. This wasn’t a naive image. It recognized that children have knowledge and perspectives and ways of understanding the world. The use of art and media was part of that. It allowed children to represent and explore their ideas, to share them with others, and to participate in civic life." Educators have a role in how we exist with children each day, one simple step that Carlina Rinaldi reminds us of is that deeply listening and offering our authentic presence with children offers them and ourselves an antidote to the violence.

You can read more of our interview with John Nimmo at the link in our bio. #antibiasleadersece #reggiochildren


Inventiveness grows in the space between story and
Inventiveness grows in the space between story and conversation.
When we read with children, books become invitations to wonder, to question, to imagine what could be.

Inspiring Inventiveness with Literature offers a way to engage stories as living tools: returning to them, building on them, and letting them shape the life of the classroom over time.

Link in bio for the full guide.

This and other resources were preserved at opalschool.org thanks to generous support from James F. and Marion L. Miller Foundation
#opalschool 
#InspiringInventiveness #TeachingForThinking #EarlyChildhoodEducation



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