“Returning to school is not the same for everyone. Girls and boys, young girls and boys return to class carrying different experiences, emotions, and expectations. For this reason, the restart cannot be limited to educational objectives but must leave room for listening, the curiosity of meeting, and the building of relationships. Before being pupils and students, young people are people: recognizing how they are is an essential condition to accompany them also in learning.”
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This is said by Maria Antonietta Gulino, president of the Order of Psychologists of Tuscany and of the National Council of the Order of Psychologists, on the day of the reopening of Tuscan schools.
School, listening to young people to recognize fragilities and discomforts
“For some, returning to the desks means finding friends and teachers again, for others facing a new school, a new class, or one of the important stages of growth. Others still return carrying anxieties and fragilities that they do not always manage to express. It is up to adults to know how to observe and listen, also grasping what can emerge through silence, a change, an unspoken request.”
Class and relationships, why well-being also helps learning
“Rebuilding the class group also requires time and attention. The class is a small community and the quality of relationships among peers and with teachers affects well-being and the ability to learn. Welcoming each other, getting to know each other, rediscovering the rules of being together, and building a climate of trust are not activities ancillary to teaching: they are an integral part and represent a concrete prevention action.”
Psychologists at school, the appeal for a stable presence
“Psychology cannot enter the school when discomfort has already become evident. Prevention means being there beforehand. It means promoting health, recognizing early signs of fragility, and offering a competent reference to students, families, and school staff. For this reason, it is necessary to achieve a stable and organic presence of psychology in the school system, overcoming the fragmentation of occasional interventions and the differences related to the resources of individual institutions.”
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AscoltaMI, the project for psychological counseling for students
“In this perspective, AscoltaMI, promoted by the Ministry of Education and Merit in collaboration with the National Council of the Order of Psychologists, represents a first important national initiative. Making free and qualified psychological counseling available to a group of students means recognizing that fragilities must be met in the places where young people live and grow, possibly before they turn into more complex suffering. It is an experience to monitor, consolidate, and develop, also because it introduces a relevant principle: the psychological dimension is not foreign to the educational mission of the school but contributes to the conditions that make it possible to learn, participate, and build relationships,” continues Gulino.
Anxiety, bullying, and social media: the risks for young people
“Anxiety, isolation, difficulties in peer relationships, addictions, bullying and cyberbullying, problematic use of social media tell the complexity that many young people experience today. We cannot wait for a fragility to become manifest suffering before intervening. Prevention begins with the ability to recognize the signs and the possibility, for every young person, to find a place and a competent person to turn to. Asking for help must become a possible and stigma-free act.”
School, families, and psychologists together for a prevention network
“It is on this path that we must continue — concludes Gulino — growing the experience started with AscoltaMI and building an increasingly stable and integrated presence of psychology in schools. No institution, alone, can respond to the complexity that growth experiences today. Schools, families, psychologists, and local services must be able to compose a network capable of dialogue and of taking on different and complementary responsibilities.
“School is one of the places where you learn to be with others and, progressively, to become yourself. Taking care of this living space also means investing in the quality of the future we are building.”
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