Informatics in schools: we’re there ... almost.

by Enrico Nardelli

(versione italiana qua)

The Council of State has just issued a favorable opinion on the New National Guidelines for early childhood education and the first cycle of schooling (i.e., primary and lower secondary school), in the version published by the Ministry of Education and Merit on July 7th. In September, the Council of State had requested clarifications—interpreted by some as a rejection, and by others as politically motivated obstruction. As I wrote when the initial draft was released in March 2025, which was then followed by a broad and in-depth consultation with social partners, the New National Guidelines represent a revision of the document originally issued in 2012 by the Ministry of Education, Universities and Research (Ministerial Decree 254 of November 16, 2012). That 2012 document establishes the common reference framework for educational provision, which each school then uses to define its own specific curriculum.

This is therefore a moment of real satisfaction for those who, like myself – with the support of outstanding colleagues, both Italian ones at the CINI National Laboratory "Informatics and Schools" and European ones within the international coalition Informatics for All – have been working for over a decade toward this goal. We are grateful to the Minister and the Administration for making it possible.

Why, then, the "almost" in the title? Because, as our British colleague Simon Peyton Jones – the architect of the introduction of computing education in the English school system – explained at the conference Teaching Informatics in Schools, held on October 19, 2023 at the Accademia dei Lincei, without a well-prepared teaching workforce in informatics, introducing the subject into the school curriculum risks even being counterproductive.

In fact, unlike any other subject taught in school – with the exception of the small number of teachers in a handful of specialized upper secondary tracks—none of the current teaching staff have ever studied informatics during their educational or university career. There is therefore no broadly shared cultural foundation to build on for professional development, as is the case, for example, with mathematics, which is taught in primary school by teachers who, although not specifically trained as mathematicians, have nonetheless studied the subject throughout their thirteen years of schooling.

With this in mind, as part of the Programma il Futuro project — which has been informally spreading the fundamentals of informatics across almost all Italian schools for 11 years — we will be hosting a webinar, led by our talented colleague Violetta Lonati, focused specifically on the curricular changes introduced by the inclusion of informatics in the New National Guidelines.

Looking ahead, I believe that the experience of the United Kingdom, as described by Peyton-Jones, points to the right path. After introducing compulsory computing education in 2014, it became clear that the curricular guidelines largely remained on paper due to the lack of adequately trained teachers. Consequently, in November 2018, the British government allocated £82 million over four years to fund an institute for teacher training in informatics education. This led to the 2019 establishment of the National Center for Computing Education, which developed teaching materials and training courses for teachers at all school levels and has been consistently re-funded ever since, most recently in 2025, despite public spending cuts.

This will therefore not be an easy task, and it will require strong political will, hopefully bipartisan, in the country’s strategic interest, since it is a process that will take at least a decade to become fully operational.

I am confident that such will can be found.

That said, while I understand the cautionary remarks expressed in the Council of State's opinion regarding the rationale for including informatics to address the challenges of digital transition: "the proposed approach could lead to an implicit and uncritical acceptance of the phenomenon as inevitable in its current form" (p. 27) and "the significant challenges arising from these transitions and their contested social and economic sustainability" (p. 28), I would like to offer some reassurance that this is not what is being proposed.

Having participated in the drafting of the New Guidelines as a member of the sub-commission responsible for integrated mathematical-scientific-technological education, I note that the text of the document is very clear on these aspects. With regard to the teaching of informatics in primary school, it states: "The acquisition of foundational elements of informatics enables pupils to begin developing, through exploration and experimentation, the cultural perspective this discipline offers, complementary to all others. In addition, it promotes a safe and responsible use of digital technologies" (p. 66 – my translation). The document further adds that in lower secondary school "... students move from a purely operational skill to a more critical and reflective understanding of the implications of technological choices and ... reflection skills on the social impact of information technologies are developed" (p.66 – my translation), clarifying that "Informatics provides an additional way to enrich the description of natural and artificial phenomena with a different perspective" (p.67 – my translation).

It is therefore clear that informatics education is grounded, from the outset, in the fundamental cultural dimensions of the discipline, precisely with a view to equipping students with a broad understanding of the complex social dynamics of contemporary life, and that the social criticality of digital technology use is explicitly emphasized. And that’s not all.

Since informatics appears in the New Guidelines partly as a more conceptual component embedded within Mathematics and partly as a more technological component within Technology, the description of the latter discipline clearly enunciates the critical issues to watch out for. Quoting verbatim from p.81 (my translation): «It is essential that pupils and students understand how systems based on digital technologies function, alongside their possibilities and limitations, so that they can grasp the enormous opportunities for improvement and development they offer to society while preventing them from becoming tools of exclusion or oppression. The teaching of informatics will therefore take into account interactions with civic education goals, emphasizing the importance of interacting with others respectfully, especially when using digital platforms. Students must learn how to identify and report problems in online social interactions, develop an understanding of the value of data – both at a personal and a broader level – and how the collection and processing of large amounts of data affects society. And it remains a guiding principle in the first cycle of education that human beings must retain control over decisions based on computer systems that may have a significant impact on people».

In short, the path is clearly marked: the person remains at the center of everything.

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The original version (in italian) has been published by "StartMAG" on 16 November 2025.