Educational Counselling throughout the Emergency

In the context of the health emergency, the team of the Educational Counseling Service of the Istituto Cavazza has reorganized its activities according to the physical distancing rules, both among team members and with service users. We immediately felt the pressing need to make our families (with whom we have close relationships based on collaboration and trust) feel our presence and closeness in such a painful and complex situation. We did it, first of all, by re-establishing in March a direct relationship with them in order to share experiences and to follow the progress of distance learning from the very beginning. In order to make communications more responsive and lively, we thought of creating a Facebook page of the Service where we added information and educational and playful proposals, and we contacted families directly through a collective video greeting.

Regular exchanges have allowed us to ensure the psycho-physical well-being of our children and their parents and to monitor the progress in distance learning, gathering information on the modalities, regularity and effectiveness of the interventions or actively trying to solicit them in case of delays. It seemed equally essential to us to strive to give personalized advice on useful and fun activities to do at home, the strengthening of autonomy and a reorganization of daily routine at a time when the disruption of habits and normal routine of life could easily lead to anxiety and worry. We have continued our consulting activities remotely for educational staff and territorial services. It was also possible to carry out distance learning activities for youth: Although the interruption of teaching in attendance has unfortunately stripped them of fundamental opportunities for learning and socialization, for some of them this period could be an opportunity to acquire or significantly increase their skills in the use of new technologies.

A great outcome during these difficult months has been the creation of the "Ideas Network" laboratory, which initiated a synergy between the Educational Counselling Service and the Institute's Tolomeo Museum. It is a permanent laboratory for research, design and production of educational games and materials. From this successful collaboration were born many proposals. The first, and also the most closely related to the urgency of the moment, was to urge the children to create, together with their families, what we have called the "event calendar": a creative space used as a logbook to organize a timeline and to keep track of the events during these long months.

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