At school, initiatives to reinvent the classroom

By destabilizing the classroom framework as we knew it until then, with a teacher teaching about thirty students listening wisely to him, each seated at their table, the Covid crisis prompted us to adopt traditional ways of learning. to cast doubt.

If the search for new models had already animated a certain number of researchers and actors in education, as evidenced, for example, by the experiments on “peer class” and group work, distance learning has made “one” of fundamental questions such as the position of the body in the class. While Katie Headrick Taylor (University of Washington) shows how much exercise helps with learning, Sylvain Wagnon and Fabien Groeninger (University of Montpellier) wonder how they can combat sedentary school life.

One of the ways to make students more active and decompartmentalize knowledge would be the outside classroom? This could be applied in more situations than we think, even in the city, continues Sylvain Wagnon, while simultaneously confronting students with one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century.^and century, the climate crisis.

Because in a changing world, it is also about educating citizens to listen to others, able to engage in public debate. Sébastien Claeys (University of the Sorbonne) presents devices to turn school into a laboratory of ideas and encourage the expression of young people, while Omar Zanna (University of Le Mans) looks at the pedagogy of empathy and Edwige Chirouter (UNESCO Chair /Nantes University) sheds light on the democratic ideal that underlies the philosophy workshops developed in primary school.

More than 80% of the French population is urban and thus the vast majority of schools. How can outdoor lessons be developed under these circumstances?

Would we first, and sometimes only, empathize with those who are like us? How to help children really understand and accept the difference? A few landmarks.

When we think of a child doing homework, we imagine him sitting quietly at a desk. However, many studies emphasize the importance of exercise for learning.

“The school is changing along with the digital world,” says the National Education Council. But before equipping institutions with the latest equipment, shouldn’t we rethink the fixed model of the classroom?

Physical inactivity is one of the current threats to children’s health and the Ministry of Education has just launched an initiative to encourage sports. A turning point in school history?

In the past thirty years, there have been more and more proposals for philosophy workshops for children. What can they bring for 6-10 year olds?

Learning about debate and its practice opens up perspectives for rethinking the transfer of knowledge. Examples.