Following the Child: Kid Watching, Listening, and the Art of Going Slow

What if slowing down wasn't a luxury — but the very thing that lets you go deeper, faster?In this episode, Leah and Angela sit down with Stella Villalba, educator, writer, and PhD student whose work lives at the intersection of language, literacy, culture, and equity. Stella traces a through-line from her earliest years teaching in Asunción, Paraguay, where she first encountered the concept of kid watching, through her deep engagement with the Reggio Emilia philosophy of listening — and into a forthcoming book that asks what conferring might look like if we actually followed the child instead of the teaching agenda we carried in with us.Hear stories about what children reveal when we sit in silence long enough to let them answer, explore the tension between mandated scripted curriculum and genuine teacher agency, and consider what it would mean to treat a child's storytelling — across cultures, languages, and modes — as real evidence of what they know and can do.Whether you're a teacher trying to hold your professional convictions inside a scripted curriculum, a coach wondering how listening and observing became skills we forgot to teach, or an educator searching for community with people who think differently and push your thinking — this episode will challenge you to ask whose composing counts, whose story gets followed, and what becomes possible when we stop treating children like empty buckets waiting to be filled.For questions and thoughts about the podcast: [email protected] to get in touch with Angela:WebsiteFacebookLinkedInInstagramSubstackWays to get in touch with Leah:FacebookLinkedInInstagramSubstackShow Notes and References:Kidwatching: Documenting Children's Literacy Development by Yetta Goodman and Gretchen Owocki