This article explores how mental imagery evoked from words might enhance the learning of cross-curricular content and how it may help cultivate students' "ecological understanding": that deep sense of connection to a living world and the care and concern to live differently within it. With reference to Elliott Eisner's and Kieran Egan's…

Oliver Herring, the creator of TASK, defines it as: "[a]n improvisational event with a simple structure and very few rules... TASK's open-ended, participatory structure creates almost unlimited opportunities for a group of people to interact with one another and their environment. TASK's flow and momentum depend on the tasks written and…

Imaginary play activities are not only enjoyable in their own right, but also offer clear intellectual, social, and emotional benefits to children who participate in them. This article describes the nature of imaginary play as observed in some Montessori classrooms and lays the groundwork for developing a position statement on imaginary play for…

This issue explores the nature of childhood by offering selections that re/imagine the idea of the child as art maker; inquire about the relationships between children and adults when they are making art; and investigate how physical space influences approaches to art instruction. Readers are invited to join a dialogue that questions long-standing…

This article reports an interview with Michael Byram, Professor Emeritus, University of Durham in the United Kingdom, during his visit to Argentina in September 2011. Michael Byram is one of the main international referents in intercultural education. The interview addresses issues such as language education, intercultural and citizenship…

Stories are woven so tightly into the fabric of our everyday lives that it's easy to overlook their significance in framing how we think about ourselves and the world. Stories are meaning making, providing a means of structuring and reflecting on our experiences in order to understand their significance. Story is also life making, a way of…

This article discusses the impact of the damaged object on the development and functioning of psychic life with particular reference to the sense of reality. The damaged object is of pivotal significance in Klein's and Winnicott's models of psychic development and experience in early infancy. A key dimension of the development and functioning of…

The main characteristic of children's play is its mental aspect--the fact that it is based on thoughts and feelings and not on objective reality. During imaginary play, children go beyond the limits of reality, and toys are tools that help them to do this. Children need character toys--toys that play the role of companion or partner--in the early…

This inquiry applied Bakhtin's dialogic process to the pretend play of preschool children using an interpretive approach. It used vignettes from videotaped data and Bakhtin's theories of dialogism and heteroglossia to provide an understanding of how children appropriate social roles and rules in pretend play and use a variety of "voices"…

The theology of the late 20th century reflects a courageous retrieval of God as beauty, but integrating such perspectives into the practice of teaching theology is difficult. This field has suffered both from disproportionate academic focus on system thinking and from excessive emphasis on ministerial professionalism. How can we acknowledge the…

Globalisation, as described by Appadurai, is the term for a process characterised by disjunctive flows that can generate acute problems of social well-being. One potential positive force that encourages an emancipatory politics of globalisation is the role of the imagination in social life. Globalisation requires rethinking the role of the…

Sociologists have documented how important place is in people's lives. C. Wright Mills (1959) argued that people must understand that they do not exist in a vacuum, but that their values, beliefs, and behaviors are influenced by the particular time and place in which they themselves exist. The development of this "sociological…