1. NATIONAL STORIES EVALUATION REPORT
The students involved in the Comenius project “The Stories of your History” are in
the second year at “Cavallo-Morelli” middle school. They produced carefully
prepared stories about Italian national history rich in details and information coming
from many sources.
However, it is necessary to do some preliminary remarks.
Italian national history, in the sense of a unitary state, begins in 1861, after the Wars
of Indipendence and the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy.
This historical period is part of the curriculum plan, but is set at the end of the year
because of its chronological subdivision.
Therefore, our students have not studied yet, with method, the events and the most
important historical people in Italy as a state.
However, in 2011we celebrated the 150th
anniversary of the unity in Italy, so
students had the opportunity to learn a lot about that historical period thanks to the
numerous events fostered.
However, if you analyse the students’ papers you can see that they know the most
important events in historical ages and they are able to find their way on the
timeline.
The beginning of Italian national history takes place in the so called Italian
Risorgimento: in fact, the best known historical people are Giuseppe Garibaldi and
Giuseppe Mazzini. Besides, students know and talk about very important people in
the past, like Galileo, Dante and Frederick II, who helped Italy become a great
country.
The events frequently mentioned are the rebellions before the unity, the wars of
Indipendence and the Expedition of the Thousands.
In the students’ papers you rarely find expressions like “in my opinion”, “I think”,
but they ask many questions and show a critical approach during history lessons.
Italian historical events always have links with European events. In particular,
students found out the deep link between Southern Italy and the great Frederick II,
who left extraordinary architectural and cultural riches in our region.