Teaching & Learning for an Inclusive, Interconnected World Proceedings of ATEE/IDD/GCTE conference - Debate for citizenship skills: a case study in secondary school

The contribution responds to the need of Italian educational and training research to promote the most functional methodologies in schools to increase the Global Competencies necessary to live as active citizens today in the new generations. Debate, or Regulated debate, which originated in ancient Greece, originally appeared in the form of disputatio at medieval age. Recently, Italian school have introduced the methodology as well. Promoted by the Ministry of Education (MI) and by the National Institute of Documentation, Innovation and Educational Research (INDIRE) already starting from primary school, the Debate has not yet found a similar application and consensus in lower secondary school as in other orders of school. By means of a case study conducted on a sample of 4 second classes of a Roman Comprehensive Institute, the study aims to detect the strengths and weaknesses of adopting the Debate in this school order for the development of skills of effective communication and active listening, collaborative learning, critical thinking trained by motions pertaining to the teaching of Civic Education, a discipline for which the development of research is expected to promote a curricular use of the Debate.