Conference Program

Promoted by ANP – Associazione Nazionale Presidi

Neuroscientific research over recent decades has profoundly transformed our understanding of learning processes, offering pedagogy conceptual and operational tools of extraordinary scope. Yet the dialogue between cognitive science findings and everyday teaching practice remains fragmented — often mediated by simplifications that risk distorting the complexity of both fields.

This round table opens a space for genuine cross-disciplinary exchange, centred on a core question: what does ‘meaningful learning’ actually mean? When does an educational experience leave a lasting mark on the student’s mind and person? What cognitive, relational, and contextual conditions must be created for learning to be more than momentary performance?

Neuroscience teaches that learning is a deeply embodied act, modulated by emotion, memory, attention, and intrinsic motivation. Yet schools continue to organise time, space, and assessment according to logics that often disregard these fundamental mechanisms. How can this gap be bridged? How can scientific evidence be translated into concrete teaching choices, without falling into neurobiological determinism or methodological improvisation?

The discussion will explore pedagogical practices that place the learner in their full complexity at the centre: competency-based teaching, cooperative learning, metacognition, the role of formative feedback, and the management of emotions in the classroom as a resource rather than an obstacle. The aim is not to import foreign models uncritically or to chase pedagogical trends, but to build a grounded, reflective, and scientifically informed professional teaching culture.

The round table is addressed to school leaders, teachers, researchers, and trainers.

Programme (2 hours – in Italian)

SPEAKERS

• Antonello Giannelli – President, ANP
• Maria Luisa Iavarone – Full Professor, Università degli Studi di Napoli Parthenope
• 2 school leaders – To be defined

MODERATOR

• Licia Cianfriglia, ANP