The paper presents the theoretical framework underlying the design of the European project Peace and the outcomes of the first year of researc

D. Camhy

F. Garcia Moryon

J. Glaser

OLIVERIO, STEFANO

STRIANO, MAURA

Archivio della ricerca - Università degli studi di Napoli Federico II

1COSMOPOLITAN EDUCATION WITHIN THE EU SCENARIO. THE COMENIUS PROJECT PEACEMaura Striano1, Daniela Camhy2, Felix Garcia Moriyon3, Jen Glaser4, Stefano Oliverio1 1 University of Naples Federico II (ITALY)2 University of Graz (AUSTRIA)3 CFpN – Association Center of Philosophy for Children (SPAIN)4 Topaz – Leading Social Innovation( (ISRAEL)maura.striano@unina.it, daniela.camhy@uni-graz.at, felix.garciamoriyon@gmail.com, glaserjen@gmail.com, stefano.oliverio@unina.itAbstract The paper focuses on the need of deploying new educational strategies and practices to cope with the challenges raised by contemporary globalized cultural and social scenarios -characterized by increasing mobility and de-territorialization of individuals and groups- in order to address the educational needs of children and adolescents at risk of exclusion for the lack of intercultural dialogue as a precondition for social cohesion. Within this framework the paper presents the Comenius PEACE project which aims at promoting cosmopolitanism and global citizenship in primary and junior high school. The chief innovation of PEACE consists in the development of a new educational curriculum to be used in order to promote the construction of philosophical communities of enquiry composed of children and adolescents with different cultural roots, who learn to dialogue and to understand each other in a cosmopolitan perspective. The presentation is directed principally to teachers and academics and is deeply in tune with the main theme of the conference to the extent that it raises the issue of what education up to the reality of a global world should look like and it endeavors to provide one (possible) answer both at the theoretical and at the methodological level. Keywords: Cosmopolitan education, philosophical inquiry, inclusion1	INTRODUCTION: cosmopolitanism as an educational challengeThe complexity of globalization processes involving EU and non EU countries implies deep changes in the spatial and temporal contours of individual and collective existence, modifying many essential forms of social activity and social agency in different forms and ways (Eriksen 2001; Scheuerman 2004) and determining new social challenges and new educational needs(Striano, 2012).These needs regard groups of people identifiable not for their race, cultural heritage or nationality, but for their sharing particular conditions of life, experiences, learning, stories and understandings, within a cosmopolitan perspective.Globalization involves processes of societalization, internationalization, individuation, and generalization of consciousness about humankind (Robertson 1991: 215-6; 1992: 27) requesting individuals and groups to define new identities, that emerge from the possibilities presented by their engagement with the “other” within the emerging global whole.The educational challenge is to support the capacity of making sense of a “cosmopolitan reality” through a “new cosmopolitan syntax” which appeals to a new grammar of thinking (Beck,2006) as well as a to new perspective towards the world, which combines “receptivity to the new” and  “loyalty to the known” (Hansen, 2010).This new grammar of thinking and this new perspective towards the world should be learned very early in the life span, in order to make individuals and communities able to deal with the new cosmopolitan reality they are imbedded in, not losing their sense of the local or their cultural roots. This requires to support the development of cognitive, affective and social tools through which “growing up global” (Sharp 2009) without remaining stuck in prejudices and stereotypes or ensnared in blindness to other ways of life, in order to perform an active, participative and reflective citizenship in a diverse and complex society. Designing education from a cosmopolitan point of view does not mean, though, denying the national (according to the excluding logic of the either…or – either national or cosmopolitan), but intertwining national and cosmopolitan dimensions recognizing the intrinsic plurivocality of every culture. Educating for this kind of cosmopolitanism does not entail dismissing one’s own culture but in-habiting it cosmopolitically cultivating an interest in learning from other cultures, experiences, traditions, a process that sustains intercultural dialogue, openness, and the development of a “visiting” attitude (Sharp, 2009) towards other individuals, cultures and worlds. As a consequence, we need to imagine new educational devices, practices, tools, and strategies which not only allow our communities to get in tune with our cosmopolitan condition but – what is much more important – make them the pivot of a really cosmopolitan educational project.This model of cosmopolitan education requires specific educational methodologies and tools focused on the development of complex thinking modes (Lipman, 2003) as well as on dialogical and reflective attitudes and competences  from primary school age through alternative learning approaches. 2	the rationale of the project peaceThe epoch-making changes occurring at the social, political and technological levels within the globalized scenarios make individual and collective experiential space (at a local level) more and more crossed by a plurality of cultural models.  Within this framework, the lack of intercultural dialogue is determined by how residents consider their own matrix the only point of reference; this is a quite disconcerting and disquieting condition, which often provokes a parochial and close-minded attitude, generating merely defensive responses, the first of which is to retreat into one’s own culture especially when confronted with wide immigration processes.In this scenario, immigrant children and minority groups often experience educational and social disadvantages, which are mainly due not only to conditions of deprivation and social exclusion but also to the lack of intercultural dialogue which requires specific strategies to defeat prejudice, to challenge stereotypes, to overcome cultural obstacles, and to foster dialogue. Cosmopolitanism is increasingly viewed by many scholars (Nussbaum, 2003; Hansen, 2010a; Hansen, 2011; Koczanowicz, 2010; Mignolo, 2012; Strand, 2010a; Strand, 2010b; Todd, 2010) as a valid educational answer to cope with these challenges and, indeed, education for a cosmopolitan engagement through specific actions and practices seems to be the most effective with reference to children and adolescents. Within this framework, the EU funded Comenius project PEACE (Philosophical Enquiry Advancing Cosmopolitan Engagement) is focused on promoting cosmopolitan education both for children and adolescents who come from different cultural backgrounds and for residents. The project involves four partner countries (Austria, Israel, Italy, Spain) and is going to be developed in 36 months.The aim is deepening an authentic understanding for other cultures, building mutual respect to “the other”, exchanging experiences as well as knowledge, giving the children and adolescents a voice, helping them to think for themselves and become sensitive, effective, creative thinkers having the confidence to articulate their own thoughts. Focusing the need of children and adolescents at risk, the project achieves its goal by reaffirming the value of philosophy as an educational tool and by developing intercultural dialogue through philosophical inquiry. For this reason, the project aims at using the validated methodology of Philosophy for Children (P4C) to involve marginalised and disadvantaged children and adolescents who belong to different cultures, such as immigrants, in a high quality learning context, therefore offering to them an imaginative travelling to reconstruct their own worlds, which is an excellent opportunity for their social development and intercultural integration. The approach to cosmopolitanism and intercultural dialogue in PEACE happens less through a mere working and living together than through the involvement of children into a philosophical dialogue and the practice of philosophizing in a context of a community of inquiry is a very fruitful opportunity to promote cosmopolitan skills, dispositions and styles. In the modelling of the community of philosophical inquiry among children and adolescents a new frame of mind is expected to appear. Children and adolescents can construct and reconstruct their ideas by collecting and exchanging their thoughts through a way of reasoning and understanding that leads to “openness to the new” global dimension but it is also a “loyalty to the known” drawing new reflexive circles around their experiences and intentionally entering into the worlds of different people with different views, listening attentively to their stories, trying to figure out the world view from which they are coming, and how they might see other perspectives as strange; the educational advantage is the possibility to confront their own values and beliefs, to revise and question their own point of view when they get in touch with the beliefs and values of others.Within this scenario, the project involves both resident children and adolescents as well as children and adolescents belonging to cultural minorities, who moreover require dedicated educational actions to fulfill their potential and need to be provided with cognitive and cultural tools which can support their learning and living, helping them in achieving higher levels of inclusion and participation.Targeting mixed communities of residents and immigrants, PEACE aims at fostering the development of dialogical and reflective competencies that are the basis for the construction of a real cosmopolitan dialogue considered as a precondition for social cohesion and social development.Moreover, fighting exclusion and promoting the participation of disadvantaged groups such as immigrants and minorities in the cultural arena will give rise to a real intercultural and cosmopolitan community.3	Educational objectives for children, teachers, communities The development of a cosmopolitan society implies education for an active citizenship in a democracy intended as a wide space of confront and dialogue to prepare people for life. One focus of the project PEACE is developing learner’s abilities for taking actions as democratic citizens within the global scenario, taking into account both local and global issues. That means promoting an awareness of cultural and linguistic diversity as a resource for democratic thinking, as well as of the need to combat racism, prejudice and xenophobia intended as the by product of parochial and narrow minded positions.PEACE fosters the mutual knowledge and comprehension of different cultures by improving children’s and adolescent’s critical, creative, collaborative and caring thinking; this involves the promotion of affective and thinking skills as well as the acquisition of new forms of knowledge and understanding and the development of specific skills and aptitudes, values and disposition. Growing up practicing dialogue, the students will become able to sustain intercultural dialogue and to perform an active citizenship in order to promote ethnic and gender equality, solidarity, and social cohesion within a cosmopolitan framework in all the dimensions of associate life. On  these basis, the ultimate aim of PEACE is to provide, through an innovative educational approach, an opportunity for the widest possible section of society to understand that it is possible to improve children's and adolescent’s communication and conflict-resolution skills, so as to contribute to the development of tolerance, mutual understanding and cooperation among future citizens.According to its rationale, the specific educational objectives addressed by PEACE are the following: •	To help students and teachers in developing a cosmopolitan frame of mind combining openness to the different and to the new and authenticity and loyalty at one’s own culture and identity ;•	To develop a sense of European citizenship based on understanding and respect for human rights and democracy ;•	To foster children’s cognitive and affective skills needed to cope with the challenges of living together in multicultural societies; •	To enhance the quality and European and international dimension of teacher training and professional development for educators;•	To support improvements in pedagogical approaches to global, cosmopolitan and social issues;•	Promoting an awareness of the importance of cultural and linguistic diversity within Europe, as well as of the need to combat racism, prejudice and xenophobia; •	Promoting equality and contributing to combating all forms of discrimination based on sex, racial or ethnic origin, religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation; •	Creating conditions that reduce early school leaving by children at risk of exclusion (cultural, social and economic).These objectives have to be achieved through specific educational actions:	Creating and implementing a new curriculum, in the field of P4C, concerning intercultural and cosmopolitan dialogue to be tested and validated in different cultural realities (Austria, Israel, Italy, Spain). 	Training teachers for cosmopolitan education through dedicated courses and dedicated learning and assessment materials in Austria, Italy, Spain;	Testing, fine tuning and validating the curriculum with groups of children and adolescents in different cultural contexts in Europe and Israel. PEACE aims therefore at the reinforcement of the contribution of new educational materials, practices and strategies to social cohesion, active citizenship, intercultural dialogue, gender equality and personal fulfilment.The project is expected to impact on educational practices providing educators with specialized professional development opportunities in order to acquire new teaching strategies and materials and using participatory and reflective approaches and methodologies such as experiential learning sessions and workshops in order to sustain the development of new educational understandings not only within formal educational contexts, but within the whole educational systems in a lifelong and lifewide perspective, involving non formal and informal contexts as well and supporting the progressive active and responsible commitment to cosmopolitan education of various kinds of individuals and groups.This considering that in the globalized scenarios it is determinant to involve in educational actions the whole social body, which should not be confined to delimited areas and fields of influence but must have greater impact on social growth and social development (Jones, 2006). In a global perspective, educational materials, methodologies and practices should not be acknowledged as technical sets of tools, but as funds or experiential and empirical resources, which can be reflectively adapted, shared, transferred and transformed within different cultural and social contexts becoming a shared repertory to be implemented over and over by a global and cosmopolitan community of educational practitioners(Striano, 2012); therefore the curriculum and the pedagogical strategies and educational resources developed within PEACE will be made freely available to other contexts and countries, therefore widening the scope of the project and promoting a broader cosmopolitan awareness in a global perspective. REFERENCES Appiah, K. A. (2006), Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers. New York: W.W. NortonBeck, U. 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Cosmopolitan Education within the EU scenario. The Comenius Project PEACE

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