Panel G.03 — Cultural paradigms and pedagogical strategies for an inclusive school
Convenors Massimo Baldacci (Università di Urbino Carlo Bo, Italy)
Keywords Inclusive School, Cultural Paradigms, Pedagogical Strategies
By ‘inclusive school’, we do not only mean a school capable of avoiding processes of educational exclusion, which lead to phenomena such as flunking out, repeating and dropping out – generally summarized under the category of ‘school drop-out’. In a more challenging way, we mean a school capable of including everyone in the educational process to guarantee educational equality and the valorisation of personal differences.
It is a question of organizing the educational environment in such a way as to ensure that everyone achieves the common objectives of the curriculum (the knowledge and skills considered fundamental) and to allow everyone to develop their peculiarities (propensities, interests).
The achievement of this double educational goal, characterizes the profile of a democratic school, concerned with ensuring that all future citizens have the cultural keys that open the doors to full participation in the economic, social and political life of the country, as well as committed to guaranteeing everyone the integral development of their personality and their specific individual capacities. Equality in difference is the pedagogical principle that guides an inclusive school of this nature.
The realization of this principle involves the development of cultural paradigms of education that align with it. What is needed is a general conception of the teaching-learning process, that is consistent with this principle and capable of orienting the educational process in a manner consistent with it. However, there is also a need for pedagogical strategies capable of concretely realizing the achievement of the fundamental objectives by all and the complete personal development of each individual. These strategies must be conceived broadly, not only as directly didactic but also as psycho-pedagogical, organizational and political-institutional. In other words, a systemic and complex approach to realizing an inclusive school is needed.