Lella Gandini: A Transformational Leader
Elena (Lella) Gandini Little, a beloved and influential educator who served as the US liaison for the dissemination of the Reggio Emilia approach, died on June 16, 2025, in Northampton, Massachusetts, at the age of 90. Lella was a transformational leader, helping to bring an understanding of the Reggio Emilia approach to countless educators and educational institutions in the United States and globally. She was an adjunct faculty member at the University of Massachusetts School of Education, and she authored and coauthored many books, including The Hundred Languages of Children, In the Spirit of the Studio, and Beautiful Stuff. As liaison to the United States for Reggio Children for many years, she transformed the thinking of those in the US and abroad.
Lella’s work inspired many US early childhood educators, including myself. I first encountered her in 2013 at the exhibit “The 100 Languages of Children,” hosted by Henderson Community College in Henderson, Kentucky. Lella, alongside Amelia Gambetti, presented on the Reggio Emilia approach. Discussions ranged from the hundreds of languages children possess to the power of documenting educators’ and children’s thinking to the study of environments that foster research, creativity and, ultimately, the highest forms of joyful learning.
The impact was immediate. I had planned to attend only one day; however, after hearing this gentle yet powerful presenter expound upon the possibilities and potential that every child possesses, I realized that one day was not enough and proceeded to attend the rest of the conference. Over the next several years, I was privileged not only to attend but also to host conferences where Lella spoke. Her words, whether written or spoken, influenced every aspect of my world.
Like many others, I was inspired by Lella’s passion for supporting educators to create rich environments where children explore, create, research, and generate new theories and possibilities. I learned that language, literacy, science, mathematics, and the arts do not stand alone in an early learning setting nor do they evolve in isolation. Rather, when children are provided environments rich in possibilities and are paired alongside educators who are co-constructors of knowledge and facilitators of innovation, all the content areas and domains of learning weave a beautiful mosaic through which children learn.
In my current role at NAEYC, I have the privilege to advocate for children and programs that support high-quality education as defined through NAEYC’s “Developmentally Appropriate Practice” position statement and its early learning accreditation standards. Lella taught me that all children have the right to joyful learning experiences and the materials that support them. She taught me that inquiry and collaboration are important for both the young learner and the adult, and that we as educators should embrace collaboration and ongoing learning as a way to elevate our work. Children are full of potential ideas and wonderings, and they are waiting for an educator who is willing to research alongside them to discover new concepts and ways of being together.
Lella was connected to NAEYC through visits to the Association and contributions to Young Children. As described in a November 1993 issue of the journal, Loris Malaguzzi (founder of the Reggio schools) and several key pedagogical leaders visited NAEYC headquarters, where Professor Malaguzzi shared some of the most important aspects of his philosophy. Lella translated his presentation for Young Children readers in the November 1993 issue and also provided her own succinct description of the fundamental principles of the Reggio Emilia approach. This article, “Fundamentals of the Reggio Emilia Approach to Early Childhood Education,” provides a framework for understanding the Reggio schools and is excerpted below. (The entire article can be viewed in the Young Children archive, which is accessible on JSTOR to NAEYC members at NAEYC.org/resources/pubs/yc/archive.)
The Image Of The Child
The educators in Reggio Emilia speak first and foremost about the image they have of the child. All children have preparedness, potential, curiosity, and interest in constructing their learning, in engaging in social interaction, and in negotiating with everything the environment brings to them. Teachers are deeply aware of children’s potentials and construct all their work and the environment of the children’s experience to respond appropriately.
Children’s Relationships And Interactions
Education has to focus on each child—not each child considered in isolation but each child seen in relation with other children, with the family, with the teachers, with the environment of the school, with the community, and with the wider society. Each school in Reggio Emilia is viewed as a system in which all of these relationships, which are all interconnected and reciprocal, are activated and supported.
The Three Subjects Of Education
For children to learn, their well-being has to be guaranteed; the well-being of children is connected with the well-being of parents and teachers. Children’s rights should be recognized, not only children’s needs. Children have a right to high-quality care and education. By recognizing that children have rights to the best that a society can offer, parents and teachers gain recognition of their rights as well.
The Role Of Parents
Parent participation is considered essential and takes many forms: Day-to-day interaction during work in the schools; discussions of educational and psychological issues; and special events, excursions, and celebrations. Parents are an active part of their children's learning experience and, at the same time, help ensure the welfare of all children in the school.
An Amiable School
The layout of physical space in the schools encourages encounters, communication, and relationships. The arrangement of structures, objects, and activities encourages choices, problem solving, and discoveries in the process of learning. In preparing the space, teachers offer the possibility for children to be with the teachers and many of the other children, or with just a few of the children, or even alone. Teachers are aware, however, that children also learn from their peers, especially when they can interact in small groups.
The Time Not Set By The Clock
Children’s own sense of time and their personal rhythm are considered in planning and implementing activities and projects. The leisurely pace that an observer notices is facilitated by the full-day schedule. Such a schedule, rather than overwhelming the participants, seems instead to provide sufficient time to complete projects and activities with satisfaction. Teachers get to know the children’s personal timeclocks because children stay with the same teachers and the same peer group for three-year cycles (infancy to 3 and 3 to 6). Each year the group changes environments because their developmental needs and interests change, but the relationships with teachers and peers remain consistent.
Teachers As Partners
To know how to plan and proceed with their work, teachers listen to and observe children closely. Teachers use the understanding they gain to act as a resource for the children. Teachers ask questions; discover the children’s ideas, hypotheses, and theories; and provide occasions for discovery and learning. In fact, teachers consider themselves partners in learning and enjoy discovering with the children.
Cooperation As The Foundation Of The System
Cooperation at all levels in the schools is a powerful mode of working that makes possible the achievement of the complex goals that Reggio educators have set for themselves. Teachers work in pairs in each classroom (not as head teacher and assistant but at the same level); teachers maintain a strong collegial relationship with all other teachers and staff and engage in continuous discussion and interpretation of their work as well as of the work of and with children. Those exchanges provide permanent, ongoing training and theoretical enrichment. Teachers see themselves as researchers, preparing documentation of their work with children, whom they also consider researchers. The system is further supported by a team of pedagogical coordinators, called pedagogisti, who also support the relationships among all teachers, parents, and community and city administrators.
Projects
Teachers facilitate children's exploration of themes and work on short- and long-term projects. Project ideas originate in the continuum of experience of children and teachers and in their practice of constructing knowledge together. Projects may start either from a chance event, an idea or a problem posed by one or more children, or an experience initiated directly by teachers; for example, a study of crowds originated when a child told the class about a summer vacation experience, while a project on fountains developed when children decided to build an amusement park for birds. Projects can last a few days to several months.
The Power Of Documentation
Finally, transcriptions of children’s remarks and discussions, photographs of their activity, and representations of their thinking and learning using many media are carefully arranged by the atelierista, along with the other teachers, to document the work (and the process of learning) done in the schools. This documentation has several functions: To make parents aware of their children’s experience and maintain parental involvement; to allow teachers to understand children better and to evaluate the teachers’ own work, thus promoting their professional growth; to facilitate communication and exchange of ideas among educators; to make children aware that their effort is valued; and to create an archive that traces the history of the school and of the pleasure and process of learning by many children and their teachers.
Gandini, L. “Fundamentals of the Reggio Emilia Approach to Early Childhood Education.” 1993. Young Children 49 (1): 4–8.
While written in 1993, much of what Lella wrote remains true to the core philosophies and approaches we turn to today, including the most recent edition of NAEYC’s position statement on developmentally appropriate practice. We can see reflections of her ideas in the position itself, which honors and values each child as a learner:
Each and every child, birth through age 8, has the right to equitable learning opportunities—in centers, family child care homes, or schools—that fully support their optimal development and learning across all domains and content areas. Children are born eager to learn; they take delight exploring their world and making connections. The degree to which early learning programs support children’s delight and wonder in learning reflects the quality of that setting. Educators who engage in developmentally appropriate practice foster young children’s joyful learning and maximize the opportunities for each and every child to achieve their full potential.
While our field has lost a transformational leader, Lella’s work will continue to thrive and transform educators’ thinking through every touchpoint she made during her time among us.
Jared Totsch is a reliability specialist for NAEYC Accreditation, an advocate for quality education for young children, and a lifelong learner, podcaster, and travel lover.