You can educate for freedom? The problem is long standing and deeper than it may seem today. We live in a time of educational crisis, dominated by mass communication. However, we can no longer afford to neglect the issue of education because society and the individual have their roots there.
To understand the meaning of words (said Don Milani) there allows you to really understand, then be free: Etymologically, the word educate is to teach the opposite. Education is the act of pulling out, what Socrates called Socratic, in reference to the work of midwives. Instead, teach (not so different Insignia) means to impart a sign. In both cases you need to become conscious objective: to bring out to where? Print as a sign? Someone timidly starts to speak coherently of freedom, but here the circle is closed: you can train to freedom?
Education is apparently contrary to the principle of freedom, since it is an unequal relationship, which also makes use of coercive instruments. Precisely for this reason can be exercised only in certain phases of life and under appropriate conditions. The basic requirement is the consent, that is deep trust towards the educator. This constraint is to be developed at all stages of growth, because the power of choice is already active as children who are perfectly able to distinguish a credible teacher by a teacher not credible.
is not easy to develop this condition. In an age in which we live, the boys are at the heart of so many notices that a teacher can easily be contradicted or corrected or contradicted by its own students. We must always remember that children learn much more from the network of information around them than from any notions that they receive at school. That's why a teacher must be able not just to give information (teaching), rather to provide students with the tools to orient themselves in the communication network (educate). These tools are certainly the knowledge, but even more skills.
Since mid-last century is already beginning to understand this and personalities of the stature of Lorenzo Milani or Gianni Rodari have started to actively implement these principles in their school experiences. Wanting to broaden the horizon you can see a parent in their intuition Maria Montessori, who dedicated his life to think and live a new educational model. These examples would have been in vain if they were not supported by the commitment of thousands of teachers who patiently and quietly always try to pursue this model of school, and at the heart of the education and teaching the person.
leaves me dismayed that there are those who still can not understand the significance of all this, believing that these characters have brought nothing more than an "easy teaching, which has removed the ability to study . 'S latest book of Paola Mastrocola , in fact, recognizes this pedagogy (not easy, I can guarantee) the cause of the crisis of the Italian school, suggesting that escalation by Milani brings none other than the minister Gelmini. The important thing, he stresses, is to bring the study to the teaching center, in a statement trivializing the complexity of issues related to their study.
Those who work diligently in school knows how many changes have followed in recent years and how the teacher's role has been undermined. The words of Domenico Starnone the program "Come away with me " underscore the difficult time and we make you think. The school change because the generations change, year after year. The teacher is in crisis because, now more than ever, is but one voice among many. Contrary to what some think, educating and teaching professions are complex and the boundary between the two disciplines are increasingly blurred. Knowledge, skill, technique, but also credibility, empathy and ability to teach here is what is required of a teacher in 2011. All the rest are provocations, which are received and collected as challenges, but those who work in the school knows that it is always a simplification. What a teacher needs to do is keep the balance to become a credible model. The only way to rebuild the school, that finally becomes a free gym.
