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TOY for Inclusion at ISSA Conference 2017

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Giulia Cortellesi (ICDI) and Francesca Petrucci (Associazione 21 Luglio) participated in the ISSA Conference 2017 in Ghent (Belgium). They presented the TOY for Inclusion approach to an audience of early childhood education and care researchers, practitioners and policy makers from more than 60 countries. This year’s title was “Local Responses, Global Advances: Towards Competent Early Childhood Systems”.

TOY for Inclusion is creating non-segregated intergenerational play spaces in seven European countries: Belgium, Croatia, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Slovakia and Slovenia. These spaces are what we call early childhood education and care (ECEC) Play Hubs. Read more about the project here.

Giulia’s and Francesca’s presented the case of an ECEC Play Hub in Roma communities in Rome (Italy). They also discussed potential opportunities and challenges when applying the TOY intergenerational approach to Roma communities to promote social inclusion, intercultural dialogue and access to ECEC settings and primary schools. The presentation also shared different ways in which the TOY for Inclusion approach could be implemented in different contexts and countries.

The project’s Belgian partner VBJK (Center for Innovation in the Early Years) organized a surprise for Giulia and Francesca: they brought some of the children who joined the project in Belgium to the conference! They had a day out in Ghent.

Learn more about the conference here.

2014 ISSA CONFERENCE – SAVE THE DATE!

- Blog | REYN Admin

CREATING A SOCIETY FOR ALL: Re-considering Early Childhood Services

10-12 October, 2014, Budapest, Hungary

ISSA invites you to participate in an international conference for shared learning and a joint exploration to re-consider early childhood services for children from birth through primary school. The event will draw together reform experiences from the last 20 years, as well as innovations, evidence and practices in early childhood systems. Practitioners, researchers, policy makers, parents and NGOs from Europe and Central Asia will be joined by peers from around the globe.

The conference will mark the 20th anniversary of the Open Society Foundations’ Step by Step Program and the 15th anniversary of ISSA.

You may find more details in the flyer.

If you would like to receive information about the conference, write to admin@issa.nl or visit www.issa.nl.