Difficoltà di apprendimento di preadolescenti e adolescenti out-of-home care: implicazioni per la scuola, sfide per la ricerca e nuove direzioni formative Learning difficulties for out-of-home care pre-teens and teenagers: school implications, research challenges and new educational directions

Studies on Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) have increased in different countries, to identify their short- and long-term effects on minor life trajectories. Particular attention was paid to the negative effects of ACEs on school integration and learning. International research has consistently attested and with convergence, in various countries, the presence of learning difficulties among minors who spent a period of time in contest with numerous risk factors, prior to placement. Studying our context, especially with at-tention to identifying protective factors, is important to prevent the difficulties of children in OOHC. In this contribution, we present a survey in the Municipality of Turin in the years 2021/22 with a sample of 111 minors (from 10 to 17 years), partly in foster care and partly in residential service, aimed to describe the phenomenon in the two conditions and the protective factors, for improvement of the care system. The research also investigates the support strategies used by educators to cope with these difficulties. The re-sults of the survey have significant educational implications, for the initial and in-service training of edu-cators. New challenges also emerge for pedagogical research on the subject, more frequently approached from other perspectives (sociological, psychological, legal).