Focus Junior

Focus Junior, a leading brand in the kids’ sector, has launched “Connessi ai Sentimenti” in partnership with Samsung. This editorial project is aimed at lower secondary school students and teachers, encouraging reflection on emotional education and digital wellbeing.

Focus Junior’s initiativegives a voice to today’s preteens and teens, highlighting their emotions, which are often overlooked in the fast-paced world of social media and digital life.

At the heart of the project is a digital kit for emotional education, which can be downloaded directly to your phone or PC. This includes:

• A 16-page mini digital book designed like a social media feed;
• A printable emotional education guide, to display in classrooms;
• Two lesson ideas for teachers to make the most of the material.

“I think adults should sometimes step back and listen without judging,” says Sarah Pozzoli, Director of Focus Junior. “We might even learn something ourselves. At home and at school, too much emphasis is placed on performance and grades, but girls and boys are, above all, people.”

Tell.it: a “social network” in a few pages

At the heart of Focus Junior‘s initiative is a 16-page mini-book called Tell.it, structured like a real social network.

It features a feed of true or realistic stories curated by Focus Junior, illustrating 13 different situations young people might face. These narratives are complemented by peer responses and insights from pedagogue Stefano Rossi offering a helpful perspective on what goes on inside a young person as they interact with friends, family, school, and the digital world.

The manifesto in “10 Digital Top Tips”

The “Connessi ai Sentimenti” manifesto compiles 10 Digital Top Tips, covering what teens may not know but absolutely should:

• “Like the stars…”: when you’re online, remember it’s like watching a movie – it eventually ends, and your real life goes on;
• “Would you say it to their face?”: before posting on social media or in a chat, ask yourself if you would say it in person;
• “I’m fearless…”: courage sometimes means not following trends blindly and going against the flow;
• “Goodnight to you”: don’t seek help from your smartphone – staring at a screen before bed isn’t a good idea. Talk to a trusted adult instead;
• “I’m social, but not on social”: if being offline is hard sometimes, invite a friend to do something together in real life;
• “Do I really need it?”: before buying something, ask yourself if you needed it before seeing the ad;
• “Love on social lasts forever”: if you stop checking every post, story, or comment, maybe things will resolve sooner;
• “What harm can it do?”: you have zero control over what you share online. If in doubt, don’t send it out;
• “No friends except virtual ones”: show interest in those around you, and they may reciprocate, helping you discover shared interests;
• “I’ll delete it later”: think carefully before posting online. It could stay there forever.

“With this project, we aim to create concrete tools that help young people recognise, understand and express their emotions. At Samsung, we believe technology should enable positive growth, supporting not only learning but also the development of more aware, empathetic individuals ready to face future challenges,” says Anastasia Buda, Head of ESG, CSR & Internal Communication at Samsung Electronics Italy.

Two types of lessons for teachers (and parents)

Focus Junior’s digital kit also includes two lesson ideas to help teachers explore the mini-book with students, turning it into an opportunity for discussion, activities, and reflection. The content can also be used at home, supporting everyday dialogue between parents and their children, in a family environment.

An open call to action for young people

Finally, a call to action encourages students to submit their own stories anonymously to focusjunior@focusjunior.it. The most significant submissions will be selected and published by the Focus Junior editorial team.

Focus Junior is a multimedia platform for children aged 8 to 13, entertaining them with friendly language and a graphic style that reflects their world.

Alongside classic topics such as nature, science, and animals, the magazine covers issues specific to young people: behaviour, emotions, sports, adventure, celebrities, and technology.

Both the magazine and the website dedicate significant space to play, offering entertainment in a safe context while promoting interaction among young readers.

Travel Kids – Italy in Intercity with Focus Junior is the new podcast channel designed for children (6–12 years old) and parents travelling. Created in collaboration with Trenitalia – the parent company of the FS Group’s Passenger Hub – its 100+ podcasts will accompany families on an incredible step-by-step story across Italy and the Islands: odd stories, amusing anecdotes about places, characters, objects, science, nature, animals and much more.

Podcasts are a winning tool to disseminate culture and entertainment: people listen to them to learn, study and laugh. In Italy, every month 12 million people listen to podcasts (Ipsos research), with numbers steadily increasing year after year, especially in the younger age groups. Focus Junior, the leading brand in the kids’ sector, and Loquis, the first platform for listening to and narrating the world via geolocalised podcasts, will take the young passengers of Intercity, the Trenitalia Business management company headed by Luigi Corradi, and their families on a journey to discover the many wonders of Italy: from the incredible story of Ciro, the baby dinosaur preserved at the Museum of Natural Sciences in Milan, to the reason why the Tower of Pisa leans, along with stories of pirates and witches in Liguria, to the mystery of the Riace Bronzes in Calabria.

“Italy is the real Wonderland, where every place has curious stories just waiting to be told”, said Sarah Pozzoli, Focus Junior Director. “Thanks to this initiative, created in collaboration with Loquis and Trenitalia, Focus Junior has been able to narrate the history and beauty of Italy through podcasts designed specifically for children and young people, with a light but authoritative tone and a rigorous eye for content. Travel Kids is in line with our mission “to entertain while discovering the world”, in this case our peninsula, a true treasure rich in history, culture and biodiversity”.

Focus Junior and Loquis will stimulate the imagination and curiosity of young people with relaxing and educational content, using simple and entertaining language suitable for the whole family. The narrators for this project will be Andrea Lucchetta, former Italian national volleyball team player, and Creator Alessio Bourcet aka Pika Palindromo.

“Loquis is a very special kind of navigator: instead of providing directions, it tells us about the places we visit”, said Bruno Pellegrini, CEO of Loquis. “We created it because we are convinced that knowledge of the world and its locations is as necessary as ever in this time when people are withdrawing into virtual worlds. This is why we are very happy to create a project dedicated to the youngsters, creating educational entertainment, which is one of the social aims of Loquis, where the smartphone is just a tool for listening to stories dedicated to the beauty of our cities, leaving the eyes free to enjoy them”.

For Domenico Scida, Trenitalia’s Intercity Business Director, “This is an initiative designed for families and children who can travel by Intercity and share moments of leisure and culture”. “We are happy”, added Scida, “to start an important collaboration with Loquis and Focus Junior, to accompany and entertain all children travelling on our trains, with an increasingly customised service, recounting curiosities and anecdotes about Italian cities, from North to South, in a fun and dynamic way”.

The first 50 podcasts are already available on the Milan-Lecce, Taranto-Reggio Calabria and Milan-Ventimiglia routes. 100 podcasts are expected by mid-January 2024, on all parts of Trenitalia’s Intercity network.

For the 2023/2024 school year, numerous initiatives aimed at teachers, students and families have been organised. All conceived by Focus, Focus Scuola, Focus Junior and Focus Wild, the brand leaders in publishing in Italy for the Mondadori Group, which, once again this year, are confirmed as promoters of innovative educational proposals for the school world.

With the start of the school year, the Focus Scuola website will, as always, be available to teachers with news, insights and useful tips to make their lessons more engaging and inclusive.

The Focus Scuola Newsletter, curated by the editorial staff of Focus Junior in collaboration with a team of specialised, professional journalists, is back. The Newsletter, which has more than 20,000 Italian teachers already subscribed to it, is aimed at primary and secondary school teachers. The main goal is to provide ideas and playful and innovative proposals to get the students more involved during lessons. Each week Focus Scuola Newsletter offers topical insights for lectures and group work, ideas for science labs, STEAM worksheets to make science a more exciting subject, in-depth features explained in a simple way to explain complicated topics, and features on innovative teaching methods and classroom management thanks to advice from top experts. In addition to being able to preview all Focus initiatives for the school world, teachers will also have the opportunity to share class projects with the entire registered teacher community.

Here is the link to subscribe to the Newsletter.

Starting in October, the Academies by Focus Junior, Focus and Focus Storia which, every year, involve hundreds of classes and thousands of students, will resume.
Focus Junior’s Journalism Academy, aimed at young people in primary and secondary schools and in which more than 500 classes and over 10,000 students took part last year, includes a three lessons course dedicated to media and environmental education. The first two events explain how to create a magazine, how to write an article, and how to recognise fake news in a simple and fun way, while the third deals with climate change and ecological transition. The goal of the Focus Junior Academy is to encourage critical thinking and inform the youngsters on two topics that are crucial today in order to become informed citizens. The Academy is organised in collaboration with the Italian Committee for the Investigation of Claims of the Pseudosciences (Cicap) and the Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change (Cmcc).

“Thanks to the Academies’ initiative the editorial staff of Focus Junior help schools and teachers throughout Italy to explain complex issues through engaging storytelling that captures the attention of the youngest learners,” said Sarah Pozzoli, Director of Focus Junior. “We journalists have the same goal as teachers: to raise future citizens who can think critically and adopt a more sustainable lifestyle”, she concluded.

The Academies of Focus and Focus Storia, aimed at students in secondary schools and in which more than 100 classes and over 2,500 students participated last year, involve a course of four events during which young people step into the shoes of actual editors for each issue, actively participate in source and image research, attend editorial meetings, and are involved in analysing the commissioned work and publishing content on the various social channels, where their proposals and ideas will be added and promoted.

Raffaele Leone, Director of Focus, thus reiterates the importance of establishing synergistic collaboration with schools: “The school world is doubly important to us: on the one hand because we feel that teachers and their educational mission are close to our hearts, and on the other hand because discovering a dialogue with the new generation, who increasingly keep themselves informed through additional tools and channels besides print media, is a strong motivation for us. We’re dealing with a positive two-way exchange: showing how to make a science magazine gets young people involved in the topics covered, in reading, in researching sources. Seeing how they draw on tools other than print prompts us to create formats and languages that are more suited to them. We can say that Focus is one of the most innovative tools on the market in terms of dissemination and multimedia, with its magazines, website, social media platforms, podcasts, Academies and live events that make the annual Focus Live a success,” concluded the Director.

Completing the Focus offer for schools for the 2023/2024 school year is a great new feature: the Focus School Camp, innovative educational projects aimed at all Italian schools on all levels, representing a revolutionary way of thinking about and experiencing educational trips. A comprehensive new proposal that starts with classroom training, moves through practice during camp, and ends with the development of a final digital project that will be presented in class and posted on the Focus School Camp digital bulletin board. The themes of the School Camp by Focus Junior, Focus Wild, Focus and Focus Storia are varied, and designed specifically to meet any educational needs of different school classes and age groups of students.

After the great success of two editions of the Focus Junior Summer Camp, the Focus School Camp is again collaborating with Sunnylife, the market-leading tour operator in the school trip and summer camp sector.

Finally, teachers will also be able to subscribe to the Focus brand magazines this year using their Carta del Docente and, from mid-October, the Bonus Scuola returns, allowing educational institutions to apply for a subsidy for subscriptions and magazines purchased during the school year by making a specific request to: sgc@mondadori.it.

Focus, Focus Storia, Focus Junior and Focus Wild launch the first School Camps edition, a new project conceived in partnership with Sunny Life, a company specialised in tourism and cultural travels for children between 6 to 18 years of age and affirmed tour operator of the Focus Junior Summer Camps.

The School Camps provide innovative and complete educational offers focused on students and teachers, starting from in-class training to on-field experience at the camp and ending with the drafting of final summary in digital format.

The Focus system brands pursue their licensing development through this initiative, by further extending their educational offer to educational trips: real training, interdisciplinary and customised courses – using the tested STEAM approach – to spread knowledge on scientific and mathematical subjects with the help of other disciplines such as art, history and architecture.

Such activity, designed for primary and secondary school students, aims to stimulate and involve the youngest by exploiting knowledge and developing skills. Such project asserts the attention of the Focus, Focus Storia, Focus Junior and Focus Wild brands towards both the education of the youngest and highly topical issues, such as sustainability and inclusion.

In addition to being real learning workshops, the 2023/2024 School Camps allow children to live truly unforgettable experiences under the guidance of professionals.

• Focus, a leading brand of scientific information, provides a package of ideas specifically designed for secondary schools and studied around the most current educational topics, with particular interest and insight into the technical, scientific and technological fields.
• Focus Storia, a magazine dedicated to the most striking historical and cultural facts and great protagonists of the past and present, offers a special catalogue conceived for secondary schools and designed to revive those places in which traces of our history are still evident.
• Focus Junior, a point of reference in the kids’ segment, suggests experiences developed to introduce topics such as innovation, sustainability and inclusion to primary and secondary school students – through a multidisciplinary and transversal approach – always according to the needs and age of such young learners.
• Focus Wild, an intergenerational brand dedicated to the world of animals and nature, provides primary and secondary schools with a vast repertoire of experiences conceived to specifically attract the students’ attention towards the most current and urgent environmental issues, always in an engaging, fun and exciting way.

Verona, Milan, Genoa, Rome, Pompeii and Matera are just some of the destinations planned for the School Camps of Focus, Focus Storia, Focus Junior and Focus Wild. All destinations were selected by the Mondadori Group brand among the vast range of cruises and school trips suggested in Sunny Life’s catalogue.

The complete and updated catalogue will be available on the following link: http://focuscamp.it/.

Focus Junior Days is the new educational, entertaining, interactive project-event with hands-on experimenting organised by Il Centro in Arese, which will include interesting and attention-grabbing science laboratories and creative activities for children and families. The events will take place over 8 week-ends between March and November 2023.

This intense and unmissable schedule of free events will cover exciting topics such as astronomy, sustainability, nutrition, history, palaeontology and chemistry. The events are organised with the collaboration of Focus Junior, the main Mondadori Group brand in the kids segment. The activities are for children aged between 6 and 13, with the aim of making them interested in science, technology, sustainability and current affairs by stimulating them to interact.

A project partner is Iper La grande i, one of the most important actors in large-scale retail trading in Italy, which will offer a free snack to all children participating in the activities.

“Astronaut apprentices”, “Save the Blue Planet”, “Eating makes you healthy”, “A stroll in history”, “Health champions”, “Climate change”, “A day in the Jurassic age”, “We all love chemistry” are the 8 names of the 8 Focus Junior Days, which include educational activities, in some cases also jointly with local schools.

Children who take part in at least 5 of the 8 scheduled events will receive the Focus Junior scientific passport and a surprise at the end of the programme. Each event lasts 45 minutes and there will be sessions at different times: 10.30 – 11.30 – 14.30 – 15.30 – 16.30 – 17.30.

The first event, scheduled for Saturday 25 and Sunday 26 March in the Events Area on the 1^st floor, is “Astronaut apprentices” and the topic is astronomy. For information on the activities and to take part in the programme, simply book, free of charge, in the shopping mall’s website centroilcentro.it.

Focus Junior Days: the programme

Saturday 25 and Sunday 26 March
“Astronaut apprentices”

Spectacular experiments to understand why Mercury is covered in craters, what gases can be found in the infernal atmosphere of Venus and why Mars is red, what the rings of Saturn are made of, what the storms of Jupiter are, how cold Neptune and Pluto can be. Children will be able to discover the age, structure and temperature of the Sun, defeat gravity and travel in space, understand that a black hole is not a hole… and it is not actually black. They will amuse themselves calculating the weight and age of human beings on different planets, according to the duration of a planetary year.

Friday 21 and Saturday 22 April
“Save the Blue Planet” under the patronage of Earth Day Italia
On Earth Day (22 April), the topic will be pure sustainability. Reduce, reuse, recycle… waste: from a huge problem to an enormous opportunity. Water is life: we are all united against pollution and plastic in the seas, to protect our Blue Planet and save the living beings on it. Through experiments and activities, children will be able to observe the physical and chemical properties of the H₂O molecule, understand how much water there is on the surface of the planet, discover the percentage of water on the Earth that can be used for various purposes, understand the water footprint, see the effects of water pollution on the environment and ecosystems, learn what “plastic islands” and microplastics are, activate a hydroelectric turbine and transform the kinetic energy of waterfalls and tides into electricity.

Friday 19 and Saturday 20 May
“Eating makes you healthy”, with the collaboration of Iper La grande i
Learn in an entertaining manner how food is turned into energy, what nutrition groups are and the nutritional properties of each food. The food pyramid: how it is composed and how to “read” it, the social and cultural value of food. Who invented the most famous foods such as pizza, spaghetti and ice cream. How our metabolism works and how to read food labels and restaurant menus to discover calories.

Saturday 17 and Sunday 18 June
“A stroll in history”
A journey through the inventions and discoveries that made “history”. Learn about the pharaohs, the fascinating hieroglyphic writing system, ancient Egyptian excellence such as the sun dial, the water hourglass, medicine and astronomy, the mummification process. The legacy of ancient Greek thinking, from philosophy to the Olympic Games, the importance of democratic assemblies in ancient Athens. Children will be able to understand how useful are zero (a revolutionary invention from the Arab world) and a compass, used by Chinese sailors over 4000 years ago. They will also learn about the origins of chemistry through fascinating alchemy experiments.

Saturday 15 and Sunday 16 July
“Health champions”
Practising sport has always been linked to personal growth, intended as physical and intellectual development: “mens sana in corpore sano” [Latin for “a healthy mind in a healthy body”]. Children will discover that there is a positive correlation between health and exercising regularly, learn the difference between physical exercise, practising sport and physical fitness, how physical exercise shapes the body, makes it more agile and protects it.

Saturday 30 September and Sunday 1 October
“Climate change” under the patronage of Earth Day Italia
The topics addressed will be energy and environmental sustainability… on a mission to save the planet! From fossil fuels to global warming, from greenhouse gases to sustainable sources. Children will be able to simulate rising seas, discover how energy is produced, learn about carbon dioxide and its effects on climate, the sustainable alternatives for our future and for our beautiful planet, imagine a future of cars powered by hydrogen and solar power.

Saturday 28 and Sunday 29 October
“A day in the Jurassic age”
The creatures that all children love: dinosaurs. A journey to discover the “terrible lizards” that ruled the world, learning about their features and surprising characteristics, debunking widespread misconceptions, understanding the mechanisms underlying evolution and the new frontiers of palaeontology.
Children will be able to discover what the Earth was like millions of years ago, why dinosaurs were enormous and the main features of carnivores and herbivores, the real reason dinosaurs became extinct and how fossils are extracted after being trapped in rocks for thousands of years.

Friday 24 and Saturday 25 November
“We all love chemistry”
An entertaining journey in the miniature world of atoms and molecules, through phase transitions to incredible chemical reactions. Children will perform experiments to learn all matter is made of atoms and molecules. They will learn to recognise the three states of matter and what happens if the temperature changes, and that there are immobile atoms, moving atoms and crazy atoms in gases, liquids or solids. Children will discover about amazing sublimation, what happens if the substances in granny’s cupboard are mixed, the difference between simple mixtures and chemical reactions and how to perform the most incredible reactions without “explosions”.

Fun, surprises and experiences are the three ingredients of the new project of Il centro in Arese, which further confirm its vocation and its closeness to customers, to provide entertaining and care-free moments with friends and family.
All the information is available on centroilcentro.it.

The Pietrarsa National Railway Museum today hosted the State of Privacy ’22 event sponsored by the Regional Authority of Campania and the Municipality of Naples, which promotes correct use of digital data among users.

As part of this important event, McDonald’s and Mondadori Media, the Mondadori Group’s social multimedia company, took up the proposal of the Garante della Privacy – the Italian data protection authority – by signing an agreement in which they undertake to promote correct use of digital data among young users: the objective is to make available the necessary tools to educate youngsters about the value of their personal data in order to help them become active, knowledgeable citizens, users and consumers.

Through Focus Junior, the reference brand for children and teenagers which uses an edutainment approach to offer its readers a means to explore the world, concepts and terminology will be explained in a simple entertaining way to stimulate curiosity with the right questions and a touch of irony. Assisted by specialists on the subject, Focus Junior will publish articles in the magazine, videos, posts, memes and short clips on its website and social media.

The same content will be amplified in McDonald’s restaurants with a booklet edited by Focus Junior, packed with cartoons, infographics and illustrations, which will be distributed during events organised for youngsters. Given its widespread presence across Italy, McDonald’s is an effective amplifier of values, especially among young people, who have always been one of its most faithful publics.

“We are happy to have accepted the invitation of the Garante della Privacy and to have signed this important undertaking to safeguard the younger members of the community,” commented Luisa Adami, General Counsel and Franchising Director McDonald’s Italia. “Personal data processing is an issue to which we pay great attention: protecting our users is a priority. We are proud to join a project to raise awareness among children and young people, an initiative I feel strongly about not only in my role as General Counsel, but also as the mother of two daughters who come into the project’s target group.”

“Educating children and young people about personal data protection is a priority for society as a whole, and one in which, as a publisher that talks to the younger generations on a daily basis, we want to play an active part,” said Mondadori Media Chief Operating Officer Andrea Santagata. “This is why we have responded with such enthusiasm to the appeal of the Garante della Privacy to take concrete action in this area: we are doing so with a project organised by the Focus Junior brand, to answer the questions of young people and their families and give them the knowledge to be aware and responsible.”

 McDonald’s Italia

Active in Italy for 35 years, today McDonald’s has 640 restaurants across the country and a total of 27,000 employees who serve 1 million customers every day. Ninety percent of McDonald’s Italian restaurants are managed on a franchising basis by 140 local entrepreneurs, reflecting the brand’s strong local roots. McDonald’s confirms its intention of being a “local” brand

also through its choice of suppliers, 85% of whom are Italian companies or companies that have production operations in Italy. Worldwide, McDonald’s operates in more than 100 countries with over 38,000 restaurants.

 Mondadori Media

Mondadori Media is Italy’s leading multimedia publisher, with a distinctive positioning and audience on the editorial market. Through its brands, the Mondadori Group’s social multimedia company caters for the passions of the Italians – food, entertainment, science, fashion, edutainment and much more – and reaches more than 25 million unique users every month (source: Audiweb Jan-June 2022), an overall fanbase of 70 million people (source: Shareablee + social insight 2022) and almost 9 million readers (source: Audipress 2022/I).

Surrender to the suggestive biodiversity of the sea and the secrets of its extraordinary ecosystem through the language of illusion. Until 31 January 2022, the University of Milano-Bicocca is hosting “IllusiOcean™”, an exhibition conceived and coordinated by Paolo Galli, professor of ecology at the university, and created in collaboration with Mondadori Media and the National Museum of Cinema in Turin.

The aims of the exhibition dedicated to the sea include raising awareness – among civil society, schools of all levels, the academic world and the scientific community – of the importance of achieving the sustainable development objectives for oceanic sciences set by the United Nations for the decade (2021-2030) of oceanic sciences, in particular Goal 14: to conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources.

The exhibition is an interactive experience divided into three thematic areas.

The first area consists of four rooms and two corners, each examining an aspect of the sea: from the biodiversity of tropical marine ecosystems to the problem of plastic pollution.

The exhibition path begins with a corner dedicated to “Virtual Reality” where, thanks to 3D viewers, visitors can explore the wonders of the world’s coral reefs and discover the process of coral restoration. It is also possible to simulate the sensory experience of an underwater geyser and enjoy an special natural spectacle.

In the “Sottomarino delle illusioni” (Submarine of Illusions) visitors can dive into the depths of the Maldives, an archipelago that hosts some of the world’s largest coral reefs: an area of over 4500 km² of extraordinary biodiversity and nearly 300 different species of coral. In this room, visitors will have the opportunity to get to know the marine organisms that shelter here. But to do this, they will have to sharpen their senses: walking from one side of the space to the other, where they will see the figures shrink or enlarge and algae and fish that transform into strange shapes.

The “Stanza degli specchi” (Room of Mirrors) places us among schools of jellyfish, fascinating marine animals that are found in seas around the world, where they float, driven by currents. And among the luminous umbrellas of these creatures, we can also see traces of the all-too-human threat called pollution.

This room was designed with the support of master glassmaker Fabio Fornasier from Murano, who created glass jellyfish using the traditional manual method and reproduced – also in glass – some of the many plastic objects that infest our seas.

The room “Mare sotto i Riflettori, il cinema racconta gli oceani” (The Sea in the Spotlight, the cinema and the oceans) is the result of collaboration with the National Museum of Cinema in Turin. This section offers a new interactive experience with all the magic of underwater filming, with clips, objects and unique curiosities. “The relationship between man and then sea has always been one of the recurring themes in the history of cinema,” said Domenico De Gaetano, director of the National Museum of Cinema, “our fascination with the underwater world lends itself well to illusions and special effects and we are delighted with this prestigious collaboration, which allows us to show another fascinating side of the Seventh Art.”

The sea is a treasure chest containing many different species of animals and plants: some are easy to spot, others hide and blend in. To recognise them, you need an expert eye, patience and a lot of attention. In the “Labirinto dei segreti marini” (Labyrinth of marine secrets) children from three to five years old can have a lot of fun looking for them and getting lost among the walls of this special room

The second corner, “Messaggio in Bottiglia” (Message in a Bottle), takes us back in time, to when letters were placed in glass bottles and thrown into the sea letting the currents carry them ashore. Fortunately, today we no longer need to throw a message into the ocean to communicate with the world: but through the “ocean that is the web”, visitors can launch their own message of hope to be launched on social networks using a virtual glass bottle.

The second area of the exhibition features 30 giant photographs, taken by some of the greatest experts in underwater photography – including Massimo Boyer – and depicting the evocative illusions created by nature that make our oceans so spectacular: the mimicry of some species of fish, for example, or the phenomenon that generates the effect of underwater waterfalls in Mauritius, in the Indian Ocean.

The third block is dedicated to the work done by high -chool students from the Vittorio Veneto and Luigi Cremona scientific high schools in Milan and the Emilio Sereni Agricultural Technical Institute in Rome. In recent months, around 500 students participated in the “Percorsi per le Competenze Trasversali e per l’Orientamento” (Paths towards Crossover Skills and Orientation) by designing and creating parts of the exhibition: reconstructions of models of the seabed, scientific games, illustrative posters, drawings and audio guides for visitors.

“With IllusiOcean the Milano-Bicocca University takes another important step towards restarting after the pandemic, inviting schools, families and citizens to discover an exhibition dedicated to the sea. We are delighted to inaugurate this exhibition which, thanks to the language of illusions, is not only great fun, but also encourages us to reflect on one of the priorities set by the UN 2030 Agenda: the protection of the health of the sea. It’s a challenge in which our researchers are engaged every day in the study of sustainable development solutions for the protection of the marine ecosystem,” said Deputy Rector, Marco Orlandi.

The exhibition is free and open to the public every Friday from 11am to 6pm and on Saturdays, twice a month, at the same times, at the Galleria della scienza (Buildings U1/U2, 1^st floor, Piazza della Scienza, Milan).

Entrance is by reservation only and you can book on the  illusiocean.it website and present your green pass (vaccination passport) at the door.

In addition, every Tuesday and Thursday morning, from 8am to 10am or from 11am to 1pm, by writing to illusiocean@unimib.it, you can book guided tours for schools.

Thanks to collaboration with Mondadori Media, from the end of October the “IllusiOcean™” exhibition will also be available online, exclusively on the website of Focus, Italy’s most widely read monthly, a reference point for fans and enthusiasts of technology, science, nature, medicine and innovation. By accessing the dedicated section of Focus.it., users can navigate in immersive mode inside the rooms of illusions and discover, in a virtual journey, many curiosities about the sea and its inhabitants.

“The Milano-Bicocca University exhibition organised by Professor Paolo Galli on the optical illusions and the sea is original, stimulating and fun. Three adjectives that have always been part of the DNA of Focus and it was therefore natural for us to offer our partnership to IllusiOcean.  A partnership that, in addition to narrating and describing the exhibition, allows people to visit the exhibition also virtually on Focus.it,” said the editor of Focus, Raffaele Leone. “It is original because it is the result of an original and creative idea; stimulating because it wants to encourage us to reflect on the wonders of the sea and the need to preserve them; fun because it communicates playfully with the special effects of optical illusions. How could Focus not be there?”

And the experience with “IllusiOcean™” is not limited to the exhibition. Throughout the exhibition period, a rich programme of initiatives promoted by Focus and Focus Junior, the magazine that is a point of reference for kids, has been planned to raise the awareness of readers, teachers and students about the marine world and explore the issues raised by the initiative. Starting from the issue of Focus on newsstands this month, which is entirely dedicated to the importance of water: from the cycle of the sea, the planet’s real liquid engine, to the life of the cetaceans that populate the waters of our peninsula, to the story of the coral clinic in the Maldives, with lots of other special unmissable content.

Every week, on focusjunior.it and the magazine’s social media channels, young people can also find insights and curiosities on the issues raised by the exhibition, but not only. In fact, they can also share photos, articles, ideas and suggestions for looking after the seas and oceans with the editorial team, using the email address focusjunior@focusjunior.it: and the most original content will be published both online and in the magazine. “Children, and young people in general, are worried about climate change and the future of the planet: so, as always, Focus Junior gives voice to their thoughts and ideas,” said Sarah Pozzoli, the editor of Focus Junior.

The exhibition is sponsored by the Società italiana di Ecologia (Italian Society of Ecology) – (S.It.E), the Lombardy Region and the City of Milan.

The Mondadori Group is exporting to China  in franchising the Focus Junior Play Lab format, the educational and play space for children aged from 3 to 11, developed  by the magazine that is a reference point in the world of kids.

The initiative is the result of an agreement signed with Chic Investment Group and a Memorandum of Understanding with Xi’an International Community Fashion Town Construction & Development Co.

For the first time Focus Junior will deliver, also at an international level, its educational offer and all of the know-how of the Italian brand that is the leader in its sector, in line with the philosophy that characterises the title: an “edutainment” approach, that aims to engage kids and stimulate their skills and capacities through the development of labs and activities to accompany them as they grow up.

The first three Focus Junior Play Labs will open up in China in 2020 in Xi’an, within the High Tech district of the Sino Italian Fashion Town, a new international complex that is being built around the ancient city of Xi’an, and in the cities of Nanjing, in the Kingmo shopping mall and Chongqing, in the Chic World Together shopping centre.

Through the Chic Investment Group, the management and investment company that is working to bring European brands of outstanding excellence to the entire country in the coming years, Focus Junior Play Lab will expand also to other cities in China, with the opening of 12 play labs in franchising within 3 years.

Focus Junior Play Lab will enhance the Asian market for services aimed at families: children and kids will be able to spend their time alternating between recreational activities and educational and learning projects aimed at stimulating manual dexterity, creativity and scientific thinking through numerous labs that will introduce them to topics related to science, art, mathematics and engineering in a fun, engaging and innovative way.

A result preceded by a series of institutional stages that took place in recent months: firstly, a meeting in China in November 2018, an event organised by the Italy-China Foundation at Palazzo Clerici in Milan and the visit of a delegation from the government of Xi’an to Palazzo Mondadori in Segrate in March this year. Cooperation activities in China will continue in the coming years with the introduction of new initiatives currently under development.

The new project is consistent with the objective of the Mondadori Group to  concentrate on its brand leaders with the best multi-platform development potential.

Focus Junior is a magazine dedicated to curious kids that is a brand extension of di Focus, the Mondadori Group magazine that is a point of reference in popular science and entertainment and is the nucleus of a multimedia system able to transform readers into authentic “inhabitants” of the world of Focus, right from the pre-school years. In print and on the web and social networks, and from a TV channels to events like Focus Live, organised around the country, the overall audience of the Focus system is around 6 million (Source: Nielsen MI assessment based on AW Mag 2019 figures, Audipress 2019.1).

Focus Junior, the Mondadori Group brand that is a point of reference for the world of children and kids, is launching Focus Junior Academy: a project for primary and middle schools featuring free teaching laboratories introducing journalism with the aim of bringing pupils closer to the world of publishing and news.

“Following the launch of Focus Scuola, the new practical review for teachers, we are opening the doors of the editorial department of Focus Junior to children and kids during school hours to offer a fun but realistic experience of what they learn in the classroom,” said the editor of Focus Junior Sarah Pozzoli. 

This initiative will further strengthen the role of the Focus Junior brand in the educational area: from collaboration with institutions and companies to didactic programmes aimed at engaging students and parents, schools and teachers, with a wide range of activities and events that speak to the protagonist of the world of education with an innovative and appealing educational vision.

A press, digital and social campaign has been planned to support the launch of Junior Academy.

From February, in line with the brand’s philosophy of “having fun while discovering the world”, Focus Junior Academy will offer every week the opportunity for a class to visit the editorial department of Focus Junior in the Mondadori Building and to meet the editor and journalists to understand how the team works and its internal organisation. The pupils will get a “hands-on” look at the fundamentals of journalism: how to write an article, the selection of photos and images and how to lay out a magazine, the news will then be published on the web site and on social media.

From 5 W to the importance of sources and the issue of fake news, and from the sharing of a post on social media to the selection of images and headlines, the Focus Junior Academy laboratories will offer students an interactive learning experience that will enable them to try out team-working and experience the key moments in a day in the life of an editorial department.

Aspiring journalist will also have the chance to conduct interviews with “subject experts” (science, history, technology, etc.), who will make themselves available in the editorial department of Focus Junior and to meet personally the students and respond to their questions and satisfy their curiosities.

The participants will also be able to take part in the page layout of their “little magazine”, that will also be published on web site focusjunior.it in the section dedicated to schools and re-launched on the social channels of Focus Junior with the hashtag #JuniorReporter.

At the end of the lab, the pupils will receive a “Junior Reporter” certificate, while their teachers will receive a “Become a journalist” kit to continue the work done during the lab also in the classroom.

To book a Focus Junior Academy teaching laboratory, interested teachers should write to the editorial department at focusjunior@focusjunior.it.