It is strictly an early childhood education approach.
Reggio Emilia values "the potential of all children to think, learn, and construct knowledge." Like Montessori Reggio Emilia is a progressive, child-centered approach to education. The idea is that the child must be free to discover and to learn for himself.
It is not a formal, doctrinaire approach.
Unlike the Waldorf and Montessori schools there is no formal teacher training, credentialing and authorization process for Reggio Emilia. The idea is that teachers and parents take the concepts learned by observation and interaction with Reggio Emilia and incorporate them into their classrooms. There is no such thing as a Reggio school. The only Reggio schools are those in the municipality of Reggio Emilia. All other schools which embrace the Reggio philosophy are considered to be "Reggio inspired".
It grew out of the aftermath of World War II.
Much of Italy lay in ruins after World War II. In Reggio Emilia a young teacher by the name of Loris Malaguzzi developed an approach which valued the ability of children to learn spontaneously. The relationship of child, parent and teacher is integral to Malaguzzi approach. The Reggio and Steiner (Waldorf) schools both arose
One of the features of Froebel's approach to teaching children was the use of gifts. He developed five gifts which were to be given to the child in ascending order. The gifts were designed to teach awareness of shapes, spatial relationships and many more concepts to even the youngest child.