After the success of the ‘Navigare Sicuri’ project to promote enhanced awareness of Internet use among young people and parents, Telecom Italia has presented the ‘Navigare Insieme’ (Surfing Together) project, designed to promote the use of new communications technologies for the over-60s.
A web platform, www.navigareinsieme.org , is a friend to the older generation. Through simple language and a series of multimedia interactions, it provides a simple approach to web communications for people of all ages, and course in schools in 12 Italian cities (Turin, Milan, Trento, Venice, Parma, Pisa, Ancona, Rome, Naples, Bari, Palermo and Cagliari), with young students who become teachers and tell their elders about the Internet, the social networks and all the opportunities of the digital tools for a real exchange between the generations. The project has been set up in collaboration with Informatici Senza Frontiere, Auser and the Confagricoltura pensioners’ sections.
‘In projects such as ‘Navigare Insieme’ – stressed Telecom Italia Chairman Franco Bernabè while presenting the initiative - we continue to involve institutions, municipal authorities and schools for achieving the European objectives of digital inclusion, targeting everyone who for various reasons does not yet use the new communication tools.’
In the first months of 2012, declared by the European Commission as the Year for Active Ageing, ‘Navigare Insieme’ will be present throughout Italy with the first literacy courses held by upper-middle school students, to help grandparents discover the secrets of the web.
Course reservations can be made by sending an e-mail to navigareinsieme@telecomitalia.it or by calling the toll-free number 800563669.
The didactic material, already available on ‘navigareinsieme.org’ and produced in collaboration with Informatici Senza Frontiere and with Holden School in Turin, is provided in the form of a story, with the various phases of discovery of how the web can change the life of the older generation.
For example, you can learn how to open an e-mail, how to chat with friends, how to book a holiday or dialogue with the public administration thanks to the Internet.
These topics are introduced by 4 character from the sit com ‘Siamo Nonni Smart’ (We are Smart Grandparents) produced exclusively for the Navigare Insieme project. There are ten parts available on ‘navigareinsieme.org’, where the relationship between the various generations involves both the appreciation by grandparents for the new digital tools, and the affectionate complicity with their grandchildren on the issues in the daily life of two modern-day adolescents.
Schools for free web navigation web will be set up in all the cities involved in the project, where the over-60s can try out the use of digital tools and benefit from assistance and accompaniment in their discovery by specialised personnel.
The ‘navigareinsieme.org’ is website is also the source of various information using the blog format, entirely dedicated to the relationship between the older generations and the web.
A community on Facebook also keeps users constantly updated, also enabling them to appreciate the possible with the other social networks involved in the project, such as Twitter and Youtube.
The ‘Navigare Insieme’ project partly originated from the results of research by the Ermeneia Institute, headed by Professor Nadio Delai, who has written a book on the Internet and active seniors, examining this generation in constant expansion in Italy, and very curious to learn about digital tools.
In Italy there are now 15.7 million people aged 60 and over, forming 26.1% of the population, with a further growth trend likely to reach 29.1% in 2020 and as much as 34.2% in 2030.
The research highlights how over the past 12 months, there has been an increased use in PCs among over-60s of between 39.9% and 44.4%. In particular, three types of use are on the rise: health care, banking services and relations with the civil service.
For the mature population, concludes the research, key strategies must be developed to facilitate Internet, use, improving the aspects related to security, initial assistance and simplification in the offer of, services, especially with regard to tariffs.
Rome, 14 December 2011
