Orienting educational and teaching actions through caring practices for individual, social and environmental sustainability

Abstract

After having been a fundament of pedagogy, at the centre of studies and research, the category of care today seems to have returned to being an invisible presence, incapable - according to the current logic of profit - of responding to the great challenges of society. Precisely because care in pedagogy is first of all care for human formation, the article instead sets out to place pedagogy of care back at the centre of attention, on both the theoretical and practical-reflexive fronts, particularly with respect to educational and didactic action. Since the exercise of care is inherent to social practice, dialogue is one of the care experiences at the very foundation of civilization. Dialogue is configured as the quintessential practice of care for the self, the other and the planet. It contributes to forming the planetary human being, capable of being in the space of encounter where dialogic, open and ironic communication provides an indispensable tool to redefine the subject’s forma mentis in the direction of intentional action, fundamental to constructing a more democratic, critical and sustainable society.