Learning through play to build inclusive contexts together. A training experience in Italian multicultural schools

An increasing number of young children in Italy lives in educational poverty – the country is one of the worst affected in the EU (Save-the-Children, 2016). Migrant status is a key risk factor: a harbinger not only of phenomena like school dropout rates and social exclusion but also of vulnerability to hate and racist incidents. Creating inclusive contexts – with teachers who can strengthen intercultural dialogue and contrast educational failure by collaborating with local communities (as SDGs suggest) - is the urgent challenge education system should face. However, teachers are often unprepared to handle the numerous difficulties from multicultural schools. Abstract methods with subject matter-oriented beliefs (Buchs et al.,, 2017) still prevail, although educational research (Bertolini, 1982; Miato et al., 2003; Malusà, forthcoming) proves that i) play is essential; ii) and each child represents a resource for her classmates to foster inclusive education. This study aimed at identifying the effective components of cooperative play for inclusion as well as an innovative teaching method to promote social skills. The project is ongoing and involved three public schools with a high percentage of students with migrant backgrounds in three cities in northern Italy, so far. Due to the CoVID-19 outbreak, only the preliminary phase of the project was activated, consisting of a short in-service experiential training with operators and teachers about methods of cooperative play. The sample comprised one supervisor, nine operators from a non-profit specialized in integrating refugees and asylum seekers and 45 primary and middle school teachers. The data was collected through a questionnaire on self-efficacy and beliefs, participant observation and debriefing meetings.  Preliminary results of qualitative thematic analysis (Mortari & Ghirotto, 2019) regard the following categories: the discovery of self and other in a relational atmosphere of festive fun; complicity, collaboration and trust as indispensable prerequisites for jointly planning educational pathways. Further studies are needed to evaluate the impact of this experiential training on multicultural classrooms and the inclusion and equity level of the schools.