Teaching Kindergarten Conference: Where Did the Garden Go?

Dr. Beverly Falk
Teaching the Way Children Learn: Finding Courage, Hope, and Joy in Kindergarten Classrooms

In the last few decades, knowledge of how young children learn has been strengthened by findings from neuroscience and developmental research. Yet, contemporary teaching policies and practices do not support what is known—that young children have natural curiosity and creativity and are born literally “wired to learn” through play and active involvement with materials and relationships.  Dr. Falk’s presentation will examine how educators can negotiate the challenges presented by our current context to support young children’s optimal development and learning.  Strategies will be shared for what educators can do to ensure that teaching the way children learn best endures, with examples of the courage, hope, and joy found in diverse kindergarten classrooms.

Dr. Beverly Falk is professor and director emerita of the Graduate Programs in Early Childhood Education at The School of Education, The City College of New York. She is the director of the High Quality Early Learning Project, an online collection of videos and related resources that showcase the practices and pedagogies of high-quality early childhood education. Dr. Falk has served as classroom teacher, childcare center director, public school founder and director, district administrator, researcher, policy advocate, and consultant—at the school, district, state, and national level. The founding editor of The New Educator, a quarterly, peer-reviewed journal about educator preparation, Dr. Falk is the recipient of numerous grants and fellowships, as well as the author of many publications. Throughout her career, her work has focused on supporting understandings about how children learn, with the goal of ensuring that our youngest, most vulnerable citizens—especially those in historically underserved, culturally/linguistically diverse urban communities—have access to high-quality learning opportunities.

Sparking Joy: Dance and Music in the Kindergarten Classroom

In this joyful dance and music gathering, Emily Meisner, along with National Dance Institute’s Teaching Artists will guide participants on how to enrich their classrooms with movement and music, focusing on imaginative storytelling, movement games, and musical explorations. Participants will leave with a new set of tools that inspire kindergarteners to express their creativity as well as practical ideas for making their classrooms inviting spaces for dance, movement and self expression.

Emily Meisner began teaching and choreographing with the National Dance Institute (NDI) in 2003 and has been the Director of the NDI Collaborative for Teaching & Learning since 2019. As Director of the Collaborative, Emily oversees NDI’s teacher training initiatives across the country and around the world. She worked alongside NDI’s founder, Jacques d’Amboise, to create the early-childhood music and dance program Arts Encounter, which was instrumental in  the development of NDI’s unique early childhood curriculum.  In addition, she has taught dance education in diverse school communities throughout New York City.  Prior to joining NDI, Emily danced professionally with Boston Ballet. She received her MA  in Education from Bank Street College.

Wondering Small and Slow in the Garden

Kindergarten teachers know the value of play and open-ended exploration, yet classrooms get crowded with “one more thing” children “need to be ready for” next year. Kindergarten isn’t a bridge in order to get somewhere in the future. Kindergarten is a present, precious moment—a wildflower field of learning—that deserves to be honored for all that it is. How might our attention to small and slow expand opportunities for children to wonder, create, and express who they are in the beautiful, rich soils of Kindergarten? 

Melissa A. Butler has worked in the landscapes of curiosity, play, young children, and educator practice for three decades. She was a K-2 public school teacher for 23 years, spending the last nine of those years in Kindergarten. Her favorite place to be is on a carpet playing with 5-year-olds (or in the forest with moss). She led the early development of Educators’ Neighborhood (a project of the Fred Rogers Institute), is co-founder of Children’s Innovation Project, founder of Reimagining Project, and an advisor and consultant with the Western PA Writing Project. Melissa is the author of How to Notice, a nonfiction book for adults, and in a button, a picture book for children. She writes regular essays through her Noticing Matters Substack and shares small invitations for everyday nourishment through Button Snail Hum. Through all that she does, Melissa is guided by delight and questions of slowness, wonder, awe, unknowing, joy, trust, and love. melissaabutler.com

Alvin Irby is an award-winning early childhood educator, TED speaker, author, and comedian. He is founder and chief reading inspirer at Barbershop Books, a national literacy non-profit that inspires Black boys and other vulnerable children to read for fun. His work with Barbershop Books earned him the National Book Foundation’s Innovations in Reading Prize. Irby is passionate about helping caregivers and teachers understand and address the systemic challenges that inhibit children’s intrinsic motivation to read and learn.

Friday, March 13, 2026 (On-Site)

Saturday, March 14, 2026 (On-Site)

Friday, March 13, 2026 (Online)

Saturday, March 14, 2026

Participants attending the conference on site will select one of the following Saturday morning Roundtables.

Reframing Kindergarten: Creating Boy-Friendly Early Learning Spaces

Research highlights a challenging dynamic in early education: boys, across racial and ethnic groups, are often perceived as less mature than their girl counterparts when entering kindergarten. This perception can lead to a lag in their academic and social performance. While some scholars suggest delayed entry for boys, this perspective often overlooks a critical issue-which is the structural feminization of kindergarten and early schooling spaces. This environment can inadvertently marginalize boys and contribute to their academic struggles. This Roundtable moves beyond surface-level solutions to explore how the design and pedagogy of early learning environments impact young boys. Attendees will gain a deeper understanding of the institutional structures at play and learn concrete strategies to make their classrooms more equitable and supportive for all boys, regardless of racial and ethnic backgrounds.

Dr. Nathaniel Bryan is an associate professor of early childhood education in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Texas-Austin. Dr. Bryan is the author of Toward a BlackboyCrit Pedagogy: Black boys, Male Teachers, and Early Childhood Classroom Practices (Routledge Press, 2021). He is the recipient of the 2024 Early Career Award from the American Educational Research Association’s Division K Teaching and Teacher Education, and a recent recipient of the Foundation for Child Development grant focusing on the mathematical success of Black boys in early childhood education. He earned a BA in French from the University of South Carolina-Columbia, an MEd in Gifted Education and Early Childhood Education from Columbia College, and PhD in Early Childhood Education from the University of South Carolina-Columbia.

Creating Collaborations: Honoring Our Children and Their Families

Families are already doing the work of literacy—engaging with their children in powerful ways, often without realizing it, whether it’s through storytelling, cooking, or everyday conversations in multiple languages. By recognizing and honoring the diverse literacy practices happening at home, we can move away from school-centric, one-off events to create more inclusive and meaningful educational environments in the classroom. In this roundtable, we will explore how to create ongoing partnerships with families that can transform students’ learning experiences while celebrating the cultural richness that their families bring. 

Nawal Qarooni is a Jersey City-based educator, writer, and adjunct professor. Drawing on her work as an inquiry-based leader, mother, and proud daughter of immigrants, Nawal’s pedagogy is centered in the rich and authentic learning that all families gift to their children every day. She is the author of Nourishing Caregiver Collaborations: Elevating Home Experiences and Classroom Practices for Collective Care (Stenhouse/ Routledge 2024). Qarooni has worked for the last two decades as a classroom teacher, instructional coach, staff developer, researcher, professor and currently teaches at New York University in the Teacher Residency program. She holds a BA in English from the University of Michigan, a MAT from Brooklyn College, and a MA in Journalism from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School.

AI and Equity in Kindergarten

AI is everywhere, including in our Kindergarten classrooms. As school districts and teachers’ unions push for greater integration of AI in instruction and curriculum, how can we ensure that AI is being used to advance equity? In this roundtable, participants will learn about how AI can be leveraged to ethically promote anti-racist, anti-ableist pedagogy. Participants will also collectively explore their questions about and experiences with AI with the aim of investigating the potential of AI to bring about social justice in the Kindergarten classroom.

Dr. Soyoung Park is a faculty member and the Director of Online Programs in Early Childhood and Childhood Special Education at the Bank Street Graduate School of Education. A former special education and inclusion teacher, Dr. Park’s research focuses on transforming schools to be more accessible, inclusive, and socially just for children of color with disabilities and their families. She has published her work in numerous peer-reviewed journals and presented in conferences nationwide. Dr. Park’s new book (Re)Imagining Inclusion for Children of Color with Disabilities was released in 2025 by Harvard Education Press.