On-line Communities: 1.5 Million Italians Participate in Social Networks

 
Nearly one and a half million people partecipate in social networking communities such as YouTube, Myspace and Facebook, according to the Italians and Relationship Marketing survey commissioned by AssoComunicazione. This is almost 9% of the Italian population that has used the Internet at least once in the last three months. The majority (83.4%) wants to meet new people and attributes specific functions to this instrument (nearly three per person). Reasons for using the networks include presenting a personal or professional profile and sharing videos and/or photos with others.
 
Nonetheless, the survey does not reveal the presence of social networking tools in didactics, a phenomenon that is qualitative rather than qualitative. During the Fifth Thematic Week organised by the Fondazione Mondo Digitale at the Città Educativa of Rome and dedicated to cooperative learning, scholls proposed several initiatives for the use of the new social networking tools. The De Filippo School in Guidonia illustrated the Cooperative growing Project, an excellent case study that has been inserted in the Fondazione Mondo Digitale’s On-line Learning environment.
 
Tools such as instant messaging, blogs and forums, if used responsibly, are extraordinary working tools to create learning and cooperation communities. This has also been experimented in developing countries. Amongst the winners of the fourth edition of the Global Junior Challenge, the Digital Inclusion for Social Inclusion Project created by the Cdi of Montevideo in Uruguay, provided new arenas for socialising and learning on-line. Thirty schools have already joined this virtual citizenship working on-line to create unconventional cooperative learning and training experiences where pupils become trainers.