Have you ever created an emergent curriculum or wondered what it would be like? Consider the following questions as you share your experiences and/or ideas about emergent curriculum:

• Have you ever designed an emergent curriculum for young children? If so, describe the process.

1. Think about an individual child or a group of infants, toddlers, preschoolers, or school age students that you know and/or have worked with.
2. Identify something (a topic, skill, concept, idea, experience) that the child(ren) are passionate about, interested in, or engaged with.
3. How you could turn the child(ren’s) interest(s) into an emergent curriculum theme?

Here is an example: Johnny loves dinosaurs and talks about them every day. He draws dinosaurs, reads books about dinosaurs, and chooses the classroom bin of dinosaurs every chance he gets. To build on his interest his classroom teacher plans a unit of study to help Johnny and other interested classmates learn about dinosaurs and their natural habitats.