Abstract:

Main aim of the paper is to propose and discuss pedagogical strategies for lifelong and lifewide education, inclusion, participation, within a system based on the concept of equity, as tools capable of giving opportunities in all fields, starting with those cultural, economic and social, to all, regardless of gender, age, socio-economic status, or ethnic origin.

We must take into consideration current international, European and Italian data relating to poverty, both absolute and relative, which also include educational poverty, which make the achievement of goals aimed at equity even more complex and difficult.

In this perspective, it is essential to reflect and remove obstacles to ensure full right to education for all, without discrimination, in a dimension of inclusive education. In a present disoriented and disintegrating society, there is increasingly strong need for recovering own identity and subjectivity, through appropriate pedagogical strategies guided by the concept of equity.

In an international scenario, also characterized by a strong economic and financial crisis, and in a national context where the expenditure on education is steadily decreasing, it has been developed an autobiographical writing project in a bottom-up perspective, through an original format used in various contexts, school, university, workplace, including some difficult, such as prison or gender anti-violence centres.

Autobiographical methods, therefore, allow reflecting about self, through experiences lived in past, and to build own identity, to help in integrating and relating actively and fruitfully in society.

The research project fits in the now settled tradition of narrative pedagogy (i.e., Alberici, Alheit, Cambi, Demetrio, Dominicé, Merrill, West) and it is a research/education project.

An original autobiographical format and a final satisfaction questionnaire had administered. Data analysis had based on both quantitative and qualitative methodologies, the latter is a simplified protocol as result of an original reworking of Grounded Theory by Glaser and Strauss.

Through retrospect, the individual is able to find a new way of life characterized by a strong educational and training impact, implying a cognitive and social change.

Main results show that participants feel great need to reflect on themselves and to talk about themselves and communicate. From the various stories and from the lived experiences it emerges that the autobiographical methods represent an effective tool to recover the dimensions of personal identity but also of collective and social history. Writing about oneself, therefore, especially in difficult contexts or moments, allows recovering the dimensions of meaning of one's life. A broader reflection on oneself also reveals knowledge and deeper awareness of the skills and competences acquired and of which further educational courses to undertake in a lifelong, lifewide and lifedeep learning perspective. Moreover, the autobiographical methods prove to be of support to continue to plan one's future in a more profitable and open way for others.

From the data analysis, therefore, autobiographical writing experience reveals as constructive. The identity building process, which, once structured and deep-seated, it will offer more and better opportunities to open up to others and to the world, to make plans, and finally also to seize new opportunities for inclusion, participation and, therefore, also towards equity.

Keywords:

Autobiographical methods, Identity, Inclusion, Equity, Lifelong, lifewide and lifedeep learning.