We are about to start the school year in 2025. There are many challenges. The world has been in a state of turmoil, and children are caught up in the midst of it all. However, school cannot come to a halt. School must keep pace with the issues of our time. School inspires thought and encourages reflection. School can and must bring the discussion of contemporary issues to children.

Amid so many important topics, I’ve identified three key areas that I consider essential for educational work this year. They are: practical life skills, interpersonal and social skills, and mindful consumption.

Practical Life Skills

In Japan, for example, there is no school transportation, because even the children walk to school. There are no snacks or school meals, because the children bring lunchboxes with food from home. Cleaning, including the bathrooms, is done by the children. Each child cleans their own school.

In high school, boys are required to turn in sewn projects as part of their life skills education. We don’t need to become like Japan to understand that children need to learn about the world, and that includes knowing how to cut, organize, draw, film, cook, converse, ask for things, say thank you, clean, and thousands of other necessary skills.

Autonomy is freedom. Even Vygotsky asserted that activity gives meaning to life. In other words, those who do nothing are nothing and can do nothing. Knowing things is cultivating power—the power of freedom. Early childhood education is a space for building agency, which includes living with minimal reliance on others’ energy. Living with minimal dependence on those around us. This is compassion, mercy, and solidarity—exactly what we have in our social-emotional skills content in the BNCC.

Interpersonal Skills and People Skills

It’s becoming increasingly clear how difficult it is for children to form and maintain relationships. We blame cell phones and screens. But, in reality, these children also lack that all-important example—the kind you see at home, on the street, at church, at the supermarket, and so on.

Children also learn by example and , above all, through others. Personal relationships require this ability to learn by listening and observing. This is the greatest challenge facing children of this generation. The human skills of interacting, being tolerant, asking questions, listening, accepting, and even getting along with others are increasingly emerging as a major challenge for early childhood education in 2025.

See also:

• Why are parents afraid of their children's vacations?
• Four Trends for the Education Sector in 2025
• New legislation on cell phones in schools is an invitation to change behavior, says expert

Conscious Consumption

It’s not easy. This is the most challenging topic for schools, because we adults need it, too. Wallon even went so far as to say that all learning begins with imitation. So how can we adults talk about conscious consumption when we ourselves aren’t even conscious of it?

The other day I went to a fast-food chain with my son. When the food arrived, I noticed—and was shocked by—the amount of trash we had generated right then and there. On the table where we were sitting, there was: paper, plastic, glass, metal, aluminum, and a lot of organic waste. I thought to myself: something is wrong here. If every person on the planet produced this much trash, the Earth wouldn’t be able to handle all the waste we generate. Keep in mind that trash is the result of our consumption. The more we consume, the more trash we produce.

It’s frightening to think that we unnecessarily replace many of the objects that surround us in our daily lives simply because the other one “is in style.” Changing clothes, shoes, and household items to keep up with fashion is a habit of adults that children absorb and put into practice. We need to talk about this, develop early childhood education programs that address this issue, and, above all, we also need to get involved in this effort so that together we can change reality.

Of course, these topics aren't exhaustive, but it's a good place to start.

About the author:

Share on social media: