KU Annual Conference 2018 KU Annual Conference Program | Page 10

Concurrent Sessions
PROF SUSAN WRIGHT KIRSTY LILJEGREN AND SARAH SCOTT
Chair, Arts Education,
Director UNESCO
Observatory of Arts
Education, Melbourne
Graduate School of
Education Environments for the
Possible – Optimising
Contexts for Meaningful
Learning
Kirsty Liljegren
Early Literacies: The Arts
as Foundations for Young
Children’s Thinking, Feeling
and Learning
Those of us who have
appreciated the art, stories,
music making, dances
and dramatisations of
young children realise how
fundamental these forms
of meaning making are for
children’s understanding of
themselves and their world.
The arts are children’s
First Literacies. They help
surface children’s abstract
thoughts and feelings
and illustrate children’s
competence, agency
and empathy. Examples
will be used to illustrate
children’s sophisticated
graphic-narrative-embodied
play events, along with
recommendations for how
adults can support children’s
learning and socialising
through drawing-telling.
10
Drawing on the key
principles posed during the
thought bites presentation,
this session will further
unpack these ideas from
both a philosophical and
practical perspective.

How is the
environment
considered during the
planning process?
Is it designed from a
child’s perspective?

Is the outdoors given
as much attention
as the indoor
environment?
Participants will be
immersed in an
environment that
welcomes dialogue,
questions and wonderings
as we critically reflect
on the role of the
environment and how
it informs teaching and
learning opportunities.
Creative Contexts or
the Architecture for
Free Thinking
Sarah Scott
Ideally, in a child centred
environment, learning
evolves from explorations
initiated by the child and
is integrated within the
processes of play, in a
natural place with a variety
of sensory experiences
and infinite possibilities to
explore the world around
us.
To support this, the
architecture of a children’s
centre must provide
a variable ambient
environment with sensory
enrichment, multiple
scales, a lack of enclosure
and allow for children’s
free movement and
choices.
KU Annual Conference 2018