Inclusive education, criticality and social commitment. Teacher innovation and Service-learning within teacher ́s initial training

During the school year 2018/2019 a service learning experience called Education for peace and good treatment was carried out in the first year of the Early Childhood Ed­ucation Degree of the University of Cádiz. This didactic experience aimed to meet the necessary requirements to promote com­munication between a Nursery School and the pupils’ families. Likewise, another ob­jective was to provide undergraduates with a contextualized academic learning which starting from an actual educational and social issue favoured the training on com­petences and values for the exercise of a critical and reflexive teaching; a socially re­sponsible teaching committed to an inclu­sive, equitable and high quality education. The initiative was based on the planning of educational intergenerational workshops where the students, their grandfathers and grandmothers participated; it was held during the Universal Children’s Day on No­vember 20th. This paper analyzes the orga­nization of this initiative in the university classroom and it particularly focuses on the learning of the competences and val­ues for a critical and reflexive teaching. The information was collected from the under­graduates’ discursive productions. It is con­cluded that the service learning initiative made it possible to work on interpersonal and intrapersonal competencies, as well as on instrumental competencies for the implementation of the project, and also on those competencies directly related to commitment to teaching. In the same way, the experience examined the valuation of solidarity and diversity.