The Italian Kindergarten is a state-recognised private school housed in the premises of the Italian State School of Athens. The facility is located in Ano Patissia, in a district historically inhabited by Italians, and offers its pupils a 360-degree immersion in the Italian language and culture right from the earliest years.
Thus, as well as being a precious tool for promoting Italy’s language and culture, the Kindergarten is also an important reference point and meeting centre for the resident Italian community. But it also matters to the Italian-Greek families, or foreign ones, who have or wish to build links with Italy and educate their children according to the principles and linguistic and cultural heritage of Italy.
The project
Since September 2023, the Kindergarten has revealed a series of critical issues: the closure of the outdoor space limits the chance for children to use an essential educational space, increasing conflict and impacting their ability to concentrate.
In addition, the teaching staff has decreased due to the reduction in enrolment numbers, with the result that it cannot dedicate enough energy to integrating the littlest ones and welcoming new requests for enrolment. The lack of psycho-pedagogical supervision is also problematic in a complex situation, both for individual cases and for group dynamics.
With this project, the association therefore wishes to achieve a series of objectives:
- improving the relational dynamics in class groups, by assisting the growth of individual children in relation to individual difficulties and acquiring the necessary expertise with a view to the group of older children entering the primary school;
- improving the skills of teaching staff in relation to managing problematic situations that have emerged;
- reactivating the outdoor space by making this secure;
- restructuring the class groups by creating three homogeneous classes by age;
- introducing a third reference educator with specific educational expertise in behavioural and attention deficit issues, such as a psycho-pedagogical support figure for teachers to outline individual educational projects and strategies for managing group dynamics.
The beneficiaries
The direct beneficiaries of the project “Small steps for feeling good together” will be the 27 children from 3 to 6 years who attend the kindergarten and the 3 kindergarten teachers, with positive repercussions for the 54 parents and guardians of minors.
Indirectly, the teachers of the Italian State Primary School of Athens will also benefit from the actions outlined above, as they will welcome children who are better prepared developmentally and educationally to be enrolled in the primary school.
Project name: Small steps for feeling good together
Proposing organisation: Parents’ association of the pupils of the Italian Kindergarten in Athens
Area of intervention: Inclusion & Social Developmen