1. First Documents
Dear Partners,
I send you some documentation related to our Intensive Programme.
Kristina Bartley, Teacher from the University College of Borås, sent some very good articles about Child Friendly Cities, which I included in this collection. They are inspiring for our project – in our contemporary world, the search on how to make a Child Friendly City and empower children´s rights to access, safety, inclusion and participation, is fundamental!
1. European Network of Child Friendly Cities 2011
2. The Child Friendly Cities Research Program 2008
3. Building better cities with children and youtheubrief 2002
4. Building childfriendly cities cfc_booklet_eng 2004
I also include some documentation we collected at ESEI Maria Ulrich, including two chapters from Marc Augés book “Non-Places – an Introduction to Supermodernity”, that was really inspiring for the IP.
This recommended reading is groundwork for understanding our contemporary life, in what concerns “the here and elsewhere”, and especially the importance of recognizing the “places and non-places” in our existing lives (“non places” in our cities – like motorways, railway stations, airports, supermarkets and malls – do not hold enough significance to be regarded as “places”). As Marc Augé underlines: “If a place can be defined as relational, historical and concerned with identity, then a space which cannot be defined as relational, or historical, or concerned with identity will be a non-place. (…) supermodernity produces non-places, meaning spaces which (…) do not integrate the earlier places: instead these are listed, classified, promoted to the status of ‘places of memory’, and assigned to a circumscribed and specific position” (2008, p.63).
Reflecting on Michel de Certau’s work, Augé states: “The gleeful and silent experience of infancy is that of the first journey (…) of recognizing of the self as self and as other (…). All narrative goes back to infancy” (2008, p.68).
As we affirmed in our last year’s application, if an Education City is built upon formal and informal educational resources and meanings, to help children be active observers and dynamic performers in that space and time, future educators and teachers should learn to be mediators in the process, understanding and reflecting upon the complexity of the contemporary city life and their own meaning of cities as true education places.
We hope this documentation can help building a reflective thought, enlarging our understanding of ideas, issues, and values linked to our IP.
We are looking forward to meet you really soon!
Um abraço,
Ana Teresa
