Inclusive practice in Italian schools Body and music for listening and sharing without words

Abstract

This paper illustrates the work developed by the Italian partners in the LINK Project, Learning in a New Key, in relation to the implementation of specific training for school teachers to promote inclusive teaching practice through music and expressive body languages. The theoretical principles and framework of expressive therapies like music therapy and dance movement therapy will be discussed and we will consider how they have informed the work of professional music and dance-movement therapists in implementing the training programme. School teachers have been involved in a series of musical and expressive-body experiences to experiment and elaborate new strategies and knowledge to promote their empathic, relational and creative competences for  their educational work. They have also been supported in implementing a series of class based creative activities oriented by the same principles and enhancing a relational and emotional approach in teaching practice. The paper will discuss how teachers and vulnerable young people have experienced transferable skills that might be significant in school and in lifelong learning. In line with the participatory action research paradigm that the project’s partners agreed on, the paper will also describe the study carried out by the researchers to analyse the impact of actions implemented during the project both on students and teachers of classrooms involved.