Carlina Rinaldi { 11 reasons behind choices, the real or presumed motivations, and particularly the precise description of events. Once a week the diaries were exchanged among the teachers during the weekly professional development meeting, and the most important passages were read and discussed during department and school in-service meetings. The diary contents were also shared with parents. In fact, several group meetings were (and still are) held each year with the families, with the first meeting held even before the school year began, to tell the parents what to expect and how they might help their child feel at ease in the center. At this first group meeting, the families were introduced to one another and began to build a sense of community and closeness by learning such things as where one another lived, how many other children they had, and what kind of work they did. Parents had a chance to share their feelings or concerns about the infant- toddler center, and they were told they could spend as much time with their child in the infant room as they wanted during the upcoming days. To help ease the process of separation, it was suggested that parents might tell their child they were leaving and step out of the room for a few moments, to begin to give their child the idea of the parents’ leaving and returning. Parents were also encouraged to bring along other family mem- bers, such as a grandmother, who might be feeling worried about this new infant-toddler center experience. As the school year began, more parent meetings were held (several close to the beginning of the year, and then a few others as time went on, for perhaps six meetings a year in total). In those days, it was not so common for fathers to come to the center, and therefore a parent meeting was held just for fathers as a way of support- ing them. The sharing of the teachers’ notes and photographic slides at all of the parent meetings turned out to be important opportunities for families to reflect on all the issues and feelings they had in common and on what their children’s experiences in the center had been. DOL-Int_2011-jh 2.indd 11 12/13/11 11:52 AM