Abstract:

Entering primary school is a very important moment for children. The need to conform with the rules of living together, contents structured to acquire skills, different teaching methods and different teachers causes fragile children stress, which may be associated in time with discomfort, feelings of inadequacy and inability due to disregarded performance. The school would thus fail in its main function to guarantee every pupil the right to education and competence. A solution can be sought in didactics that make use of technologies in multimodal environment to help pupils understand the contents of different messages . The synergy among teacher, content and tool becomes strategic, accessible and can be scheduled. The technology supports and levels cultural gaps and cognitive differences, making the classroom a child-friendly laboratory, where teachers plan cross-sectional and disciplinary courses by using multiple dimensions to express contents.
The main objective is to investigate whether tutorials borrowed from video modeling and proposed in self-managed modalities, both to pupils and to the class group, at first facilitate the learning of cross-contents in curricula, by improving the performance and perception of individual and peer group self-efficacy in primary school (1st mid-term). Then if they facilitate the learning of disciplinary curricular contents (2nd mid-term).
Specific activities to elaborate the goal:
1) determining curricula and programs elements chosen by teachers to identify soft skills; 2) describing the learning tasks used in 1st grade (pupils aged 5 to 6 years in Italy) to develop these skills; 3) examining the designing features of videomodeling to identify the structure transferable to videos; 4) experiencing training courses with the use of tutorials, creating with tablets a customisable and self-managable learning environment for pupils, in an atmosphere of collaboration among peers and sharing of expertise that can be transferred to other learning contexts; 5) determining how the teacher’s role changes.
Information gathering instruments used:
a) analysis of the curriculum and of the teachers' didactics routine
b) analysis of students' perceptions, use of tutorials and productions. The differences in this section: literacy instrumental technology in use; separate moments of traditional and innovative education; laboratory activities under peer tutoring, in pairs and individually in order to acknowledge expertise
c) checklists, participant observation, filming, logbook.
d) group interview of the participating students and teachers.
Sample group: 66 first-grade pupils, heterogeneous in the socio-cultural background and nationality, not to mention the personal differences in the cognitive, social and relational field.
Research duration: September 2015-June 2016. Main tool used: tablets.
The data obtained will be analysed to assess whether the proposed methodology facilitates the formation of knowledge, the acquisition of soft skills, the know-how and its transfer.

The results presented refer to the first mid-term and test the steps of instrumental literacy, acquisition of knowledge and related know-how. The project pursues the possibility teachers have to build innovative educational practices, aimed at adopting those economic strategies functional to make children’s education active that are given in school but can be used in contexts outside it.