Concentric Circles: Nurturing Awe and Wonder in Early Childhood

Concentric Circles—Nurturing Awe and Wonder in Early Childhood provides a clear and practical approach to planning, organizing and facilitating the learning experience for young Muslim children. Useful for the home-schooling parent and the classroom teacher, the handbook is based on a uniquely Islamic approach to learning called transformative learning. This approach was first used by the Prophet of Islam, the best of teachers, to impart knowledge to his Companions and since then it has been used by generations of Muslim educators. In this approach to learning, the most important asset of the child is his or her fitrah, the innate nature, and both the child and the parent/teacher are considered to be learners. The handbook seamlessly integrates faith and learning through a process that transforms the learners by drawing their attention to the three realms from which the Qur'an draws its material: the cosmos, the nafs and the human story. The handbook covers subject areas thematically and has an inner coherence in its methodology as well material. Concentric Circles emphasizes both informal and structured activities to help young children develop an understanding of basic concepts and provides tools to facilitate a process of learning that is conceptually rich and pedagogically strong.