The rights of the child as an international dimension of civic education

We present some possibilities to work in the school of the first cycle on children’s rights, in line with the aims and principles of the international dimension of civic education in Italy. Our didactical proposal aims to promote the idea that children are subject of rights, and that the assumption of this perspective leads to the resolution of many problems of adults too (Tonucci, 2021), so much that the issue of children's rights assumes a priority value (Costerbosa, 2019). The article contains some examples of activities with students (from 8 to 13 years old) and with immigrant women of a CPIA: we started from a reduction of the articles of the UN Convention and from the use of Tonucci’s cartoons, which activate thoughts and emotions in original and provocative ways. Moreover, we argue that the proposal to work on children's rights is consistent with the aims of Law 92/2019, which introduced in Italy Civic Education and assigns it the task of promoting «all actions […] aimed at feeding and strengthening respect for people» (art. 3, c. 2), including children. Finally, addressing the complexity of the issue of children's rights means addressing its international dimension, because this complexity is linked above all to the multiplicity of interpretations that different cultures give to the basic notions of children, law, protection, participation, etc.