During the week from 12 to 19 January 2025, Jump Training Academy hosted two German teachers specializing in teaching students with special needs. This was an intense and interesting week in which they were given the opportunity to focus on several interconnected topics, without neglecting what was their chosen course topic: Eco-school, with a focus on special needs and the importance of nature for adults and children.
A week in which eco-school principles were integrated into special needs education: exploring the importance of sustainability, recycling, environmental education and the integration of these concepts in teaching students with different learning needs.
The aim, among many others, was to propose a new educational approach emphasising the value of leisure time for people with disabilities.
On the afternoon of Wednesday 15 January, an outdoor activity was proposed, starting with the concept of the “circle of life”, then focusing on the concept of nature and the different practices of connecting with it, practising gratitude and meditation on the natural world around us.
One way to meditate on nature is to think about the origins and cycles of life, not forgetting that meditating is also a wonderful way to calm the mind.
Nature connection is an accepted psychological construct that describes a realization of our shared place within nature. Nature connectedness also incorporates our emotional response, beliefs, attitudes, and behavior towards nature.
Research has also shown that mindfulness mediates the relationship between connection to nature and well-being.
Linking back to this research, Ecology, eco-friendliness, recycling, reuse, Sustainable Development Goals 2030, EU Climate Action… All these are key themes that lead back to the ECO-SCHOOL course and also to the importance that nature has for us human beings, simply by knowing how to live in contact with it.
We also tried to connect the two school leaders with local teachers and students, putting them on the programme and spending the morning of Thursday 16 at the “Guarasci-Calabretta” Scientific Institute, where we tackled the topic of GoGoals with the students, brought back to them in the form of a game, a clever and dynamic way of raising awareness of the importance of achieving the 17 sustainability goals by 2030.
We continued the morning by moving to the Soverato Hotelier Institute “IPSSEOA”, creating a time for teachers to share the topic of students with special needs, with a focus on social competence and emotional intelligence. The use of mentoring in special needs education.
Developing students’ abilities to express feelings and emotions. Practices to create inclusion, solidarity and cooperation at school to ensure quality learning for students with special needs.
We concluded with the Friday morning, starting with the ECO-LABEL project, explaining to them that it is an ongoing project, born from a research done among 3 partner countries: Italy, Slovenia, Austria and showing our website with the different initiatives, including the new Digital City Game “Eco-labels QR-CODES”, that aims to motivate and educate young consumers on using Eco-label to promote actions and contribute to preserve and protect the environment.
It was also important to explain to them that Jump provides official methods and tools, which of course can be adapted by each individual, as in the case of the game GoGoals: the Global Agenda defines 17 Sustainable Development Goals.
We ended the morning by asking them to draw an Eco-label that could represent their school with a slogan.
Click on the link below to watch the video of the Wednesday afternoon 15/01/2025:
“Outdoor Nature based education and mindfulness in Soverato with German school directors”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLw7fuNx-0
Author: Enza Procopio – JUMP Team