ABSTRACT
The earliest preschool was founded in 1945 at the end of World War II. This area of Italy was devastated by the effects of the war and many of the young men were killed. In the small village of Villa Cella, on the outskirts of Reggio Emilia, a small amount of money was given to the community following the sale of a tank, a few horses and an abandoned truck. The villagers had to begin to rebuild their lives and they decided that they would start by building a preschool. They saw this as a way of giving their children a better future by building a new type of school – one where children would be taken seriously and believed in.
