Early Years Curriculum in Practice: iACT’s Little Ripples Curriculum for Emergency Contexts

This chapter presents an overview of an innovative early childhood education curriculum that is designed to address the unique needs of children and communities affected by trauma, violence, and displacement. Little Ripples Early Childhood Education program operates in several refugee camps in Chad, Greece, and Tanzania, and in villages located in eastern Cameroon. Little Ripples provides quality, play-based education for preschool aged children and is grounded in social and emotional learning, trauma-informed practice, and mindfulness pedagogy while ensuring that children’s agency, voice, and dignity are upheld. The sustainability of the program is dependent on the commitment to remain a refugee-led early learning program that incorporates collaborative decision-making in its program design, management, and expansion. This chapter provides an overview of how a nongovernment organization approaches curriculum design and integration in hard to serve and low-resourced emergency contexts. The authors discuss how this model of early childhood education extends beyond traditional curricula approaches to teaching and learning.