The book includes a journal by a teacher who records her confusion and successes as she participates in an emergent curriculum classroom for the first time. Her perspective is especially pertinent for teachers who are new to emergent curriculum; it is a lesson in professional development. This is a good choice for introducing emergent curriculum to teachers and perspective teachers.

The Unscripted Classroom: Emergent Curriculum in Action provides a fine way to use new practices to tie into a child’s emerging creativity, offering a flexible set of routines for early childhood educators interested in enlivening the curriculum. From using stories for professional development to handling toddlers and embracing and teaching the unexpected, this packs in invaluable learning tools in a pick for any early childhood professional collection.

Stacey, an early childhood consultant and teacher educator, explains the use of emergent curriculum in early childhood classrooms. She draws from stories from teachers to illustrate how teachers can collaborate with children around their ideas, questions, development, and topics of interest. She describes what emergent curriculum is, the role of observation and listening, the concept of creativity in teaching, the importance of telling stories for professional development, and shares stories about developing activities, scaffolding knowledge, making changes in the physical environment, using documentation as a tool for reflection, following unexpected tangents, and writing a plan for the curriculum that emerges. She then addresses the role of teacher education programs and a profect that synthesizes these aspects fromt he perspective of a new teacher. There is no index. (Annotation 2011 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)