L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020 www.italoamericano.org 22 L'Italo-Americano B e t w e e n 1 9 6 0 and 1968 RAI aired Non è Mai Troppo T a r d i ( I t i s N e v e r t o o L a t e ) , a s h o w aimed at fighting illiteracy, as more than 10% of the Ita- lian Population was still, at the beginning of the 1960s, unable to read and write. Alberto Manzi was a peda- gogue, a writer and, above all, an elementary school teacher: he was the one who, w i t h s u c c e s s , h o s t e d t h e show, teaching lessons that went well beyond the alpha- bet and that are still extraor- dinarily relevant today. Right in the middle of the Covid-19 emergency, with all our schools closed and distance learning being the status quo for all stu- dents, at all levels, it became clear we are in front of a never-before-encountered challenge. Many feel lost, and navigate the labyrinth of the online world in the hope this is going to be nothing m o r e t h a n a p a r e n t h e s i s before a swift return to nor- mality takes place. Others simply apply to a new con- text habits they already have. Others still fear this expe- rience may change forever the school system and the way we teach and we learn. M a e s t r o M a n z i 's name a n d h i s T V l e s s o n s a r e e v o k e d a l m o s t o n a d a i l y basis, proposed as an inspi- r a t i o n a n d e x a m p l e o f methods and solutions to a p p l y . W i t h o u t a d o u b t , Manzi still has a lot to teach and his didactic vision, based on active participation and discovery, should be of gui- dance to us. But who was, truly, il Maestro Manzi, what does he (or does he not) have to do with distance learning and how can he help us face the challenges of our time? The type of distance lear- ning imposed by the Covid- 19 pandemic is rooted, above all, in the necessity to main- t a i n s o c i a l d i s t a n c i n g . Teachers and pupils, profes- sors and students, are no longer allowed to be near one another. The type of school we know, at the heart of so much of our socializing, rela- tionships and , of course, learning, has all of a sudden become a dangerous place where the virus, our invisible enemy, threatens the day- to-day nature of our connec- t i o n s . D i s t a n c e l e a r n i n g takes the place of in-class learning, becoming a parallel universe to it. It is a type of learning where the challenge to create continuous stimuli, to open people's minds and rise curiosity for learning continues, but without some fundamental aspects of the process, those that do not simply involve the mind, but also the physicality of move- ments and social interaction, the senses, the meeting of living bodies that move and explore. Distance learning no longer supports these ave- nues — which we know so well and love so much — so w e a r e f o r c e d t o e x p l o r e other ways. Let's go back to 1960, the year when Maestro Manzi began hosting his Non è Mai Troppo Tardi show. Here, the type of distance learning we find is profoundly diffe- rent from that of today, not only because of the instru- ments used (more than half a century makes a big differen- c e ) , b u t a l s o b e c a u s e o f m e t h o d s a n d a i m s . Television was not a simple technological device, but an educational system, with a precise formative mission. Manzi's show, to which he contributed also as a content creator, was supported by a precise and well structured network of "on-the-field" interventions that went well beyond the TV show itself: l e a r n i n g h u b s p o p p e d u p around the country, teachers and TVs were sent to every region, exercise books were created and distributed to integrate TV lessons and to stimulate learners further. The goal was that of educa- ting a large amount of people who, otherwise, would have never had the opportunity to go to school in a traditional way. It was, in other words, an institutional answer to the educational needs of a coun- try still profoundly scarred by social inequality and eco- nomic problems. While Covid-19 distance l e a r n i n g m u s t , t h r o u g h a never-seen-before mechani- sm, become a didactic instru- m e n t f o r t h e w h o l e o f society, orphan in its entirety of the possibility to interact, Maestro Manzi's distance learning was addressed to a specific stratum of our popu- lation: the excluded, those w h o , f o r a r e a s o n o r t h e other, were on the margins of society. Reaching were in- c l a s s l e a r n i n g c o u l d n o t reach, Non è Mai Troppo Tardi built bridges for those who needed it the most. Today's distance learning imposes (but fails to guaran- tee) equal use for all of a computer or a tablet, equal access to the internet and to a d e q u a t e s p a c e s t o l e a r n online, thus boldly defining the social and digital gap p r e s e n t i n t h e n a t i o n . A l b e r t o M a n z i ' s d i s t a n c e learning, though, used to do the opposite, because it fil- led that gap offering to the most fragile in our society the opportunity to redeem themselves through literacy. What can we, therefore, learn from a fifty year old experience, one so different in means, objectives and rationale? If we look at it from the right perspective, we can learn a lot; yet we must resist the temptation to think about Maestro Manzi only as a precursor of distan- ce learning. On the other TANIA CONVERTINI Alberto Manzi, a pioneer of distance education LIFE PEOPLE PLACES HERITAGE Alberto Manzi, pioneer of distance learning, while teaching on TV in the 1960s (Photo: Wikipedia) Continued to page 24

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