“Educating is always an act of hope, which requires collaboration to transform sterile and paralyzing indifference into another way of thinking that recognizes our interdependence”

(Pope Francis)

 

Exactly one year ago, on 19 July 2020, the start of the pedagogical programme “Reconnecting with your culture” was announced. The programme is promoted by the international research centre EdA (Examples of Architecture), in collaboration with UNESCO University and Heritage and is member of the New European Bauhaus and the Charter Alliance European Cultural Heritage Skills. This is a cultural heritage learning project dedicated to children aged 5 to 17 in order to bring them closer to the important values ​​of life and to strengthen their feeling of belonging. Conceived and designed by the Italian professor Olimpia Niglio with the coordination of the Colombian art teacher Kevin Alexander Echeverry, it is aimed at elaborating important reflections on the role and methods of learning aimed at enhancing the creativity of children.

One year after the start of the project, tomorrow, 20 July, the first intercontinental digital exhibition opens with more than 900 drawings from various countries of the world, and from 4 continents: Africa, America, Asia and Europe. The exhibition offers an interesting perspective on cultural heritage, seen through the eyes of children, and for the first time in the world the event allows us to reflect on the value of local cultural heritage and to understand the importance that culture has in the life of each person. In fact, the drawings from over 20 countries of 4 continents constitute a fundamental basis for analysing the potential and needs of local communities and for planning inclusive training projects.

The result of the intercontinental exhibition made it possible to give value to the purpose of the pedagogical programme and therefore to the realization of the School of the World. A school based on three main principles: the “critical and creative thinking”, advocated by Maria Montessori, the “knowing how to be in a society” by Father Lorenzo Milani, and the “interdisciplinarity of language and the ability to dream” by Gianni Rodari. Thus, the School of the World has implemented through drawing a pedagogical methodology capable of developing children’s ability to observe, by favouring the creative path, bringing them closer to their social realities through a process of collective inclusion and making available to all a universal communication tool that allows you to communicate without any language barrier.

RWYC (Reconnecting with your culture) is a great pedagogical project of cultural diplomacy, social inclusion and high educational quality, capable of generating lifelong learning methods while also respecting the principles of “lifelong learning”, as a “personal” approach that aims to the growth of one’s wealth of skills and knowledge, through a path of self-realization and therefore of high civic responsibility.

After a year of intense work with more than 100 international seminars around the world, art and architecture courses in primary schools, 3 intercontinental congresses and numerous training sessions, the pedagogical programme “Reconnecting with your culture” is now applied in many schools around the world and continues to build local projects to strengthen the value of cultural heritage from Australia to America, and from Africa to Europe. A true cultural pandemic that will continue to grow and to mark new milestones and important developments for the well-being of humanity. The project will soon open to further international implementation: in fact, important programmes are underway with the Ministry of Culture of Peru, with the Chakra Cultural Foundation, Jakarta (Indonesia), with the Ministry of Culture Buenos Aires Argentina, with various nursery schools in Tokyo where there are already in person courses on local cultural heritage, and with the public schools of New Delhi in India.

In June 2021, “Reconnecting with your culture”, with Diculther, The Digital Cultural Heritage, Arts and Humanities School (Italy), was selected among the main programmes presented in Madrid at the VI International Congress of Scholas Cattedre, organized by the Pontificia Scholas Occurrentes and by the Spanish civil foundation Scholas.

All information on the RWYC (Reconnecting with your culture) methodology is available on the page: http://esempidiarchitettura.it/sito/rwyc-pedagogical-method/