Reducing regional disparities in education is one of the objectives that every Member State of the European Union plans to achieve and is one that guides national and supranational education policies. The Basic Skills Training project arose as part of the Action Plan to reduce regional disparities in education, promoted by the Directorate General for Education Systems and for the Evaluation of the Education System.

INDIRE proposes training interventions aimed at teachers of Italian, Mathematics and English in schools “in difficulty” and “in great difficulty” (as identified by INVALSI in the Technical Document relating to the plan to reduce regional disparities), who are interested in a training course useful to their professional development. The course should aim, through experimentation and methodological-didactic innovation, to develop the ability to interpret situations/problems and, last but not least, it should invite reflection and sharing of experiences concerning professional behaviour.

Objectives

• To promote processes intended to improve the teaching of basic disciplines.
• To outline a programme of reflection for teachers on the founding nuclei of Italian, Mathematics and English subjects, and on the didactic strategies functional to forms of mediation including situations of educational poverty.

Questions

• Can a teacher training programme – focused on reflecting on the founding nuclei of the subjects and on the teaching strategies informed by the workshop – support the development of significant teaching practices to be implemented in the context of regional and socio-economic aspects experiencing difficulties?
• What factors affect the significance of this professional development process?