PEDAGOGICAL AND EDUCATIONAL IMPLICATIONS OF THE SCIENTIFIC PARADIGM OF EMBODIED COGNITION

Nowadays, the Embodied Cognition represents one of the main innovations in scientific research on new theories of cognition. This new paradigm recovers, in many disciplinary areas (from developmental, social and cognitive psychology, to cognitive sciences and neuroscience, from anthropology to linguistics, from philosophy to robotics), three aspects completely overlooked by the classical cognitive sciences: - the importance of corporeality; - the size of relationship; - the size of environment. The aim of this work is to introduce a deep consideration on the real effects that it has on the pedagogical and didactic sciences, highlighting the multi-perspective scientific paradigm of the Embodied Cognition. Starting from the concept of affordance, introduced by Gibson, an analysis will be carried out on how the body, through the two key elements of the Embodied Cognition, perception and action, acts as a biological and cultural mediator for the learning process. From an educational point of view this concept has a significant role since it focuses on environment as a facilitator tool capable of providing sufficient information, not only to guide the action (real aspect) but also to push it (motivation). The Embodied Cognition refers to an ecological educational-didactic approach proper to phenomenological pedagogy that has to facilitate and support experiences, fully involving the subject in interesting and motivating activities, which activate the awareness of acting thanks to the presence and self-awareness [1]. Motor activity and sport represent frames of experience in which the sensory perception is phenomenologically embodied, that is, referred to the body as a starting point from which it is possible to both experience concrete situations in first person and to live the dialogical relationship between environment and body and conscience. In this regard, the Italian school system takes advantage, on the training level, of a large space that dedicates to body education and movement. The results of the "SPORT DI CLASSE" project [2], already active from the 2014/2015 school year, promoted and implemented by the Italian National Olympic Committee and by the MIUR which will aim to enhance: - motor activity and physical education in primary school; - the enhancement of corporeality as a channel of knowledge - of the body as an instrument of self-affirmation and of relationship and socialization towards others.