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Abstract

Working and researching in a Reggio-inspired preschool for one year allowed me to witness repeated rituals of schooling, especially the walk-around-the-candle birthday ceremony. In this paper, I focus on the importance of ritual to human endeavors and share the educational, transformational, and caring quality that these rituals hold for children and adults. I give examples of three rituals for three different age groups that provide a sense of the importance of these rituals to the continuity and richness of this community of learners. I hope to have made the important point of how parents and others affiliated with any school are partners in each child’s education, their transformation, and their transcendence into educated individuals, which comes with involvement, seriousness, and responsibility on the part of everyone involved with the child’s life.

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