Dilemas vividos por duas professoras da escola pública ao ensinarem ciências em uma perspectiva de formação para a cidadania

Abstract

The present investigation was guided by the question, which are the dilemmas faced by public school teachers whilst indicating public policies sacred stories considering education for citizenship? The term sacred story was developed by Clandinin and Connelly ( 1995) to refer to the manner in which the theoretical speech of educational research is presented to teachers. In the context of this research, education for citizenship in the teaching of science is regarded as sacred story. Above all, in the Science-Technology-Society approach to teaching science, education for citizenship has been a strongly emphasized speech in researches as well as in official curricular guidance. Commonly, research in the area of teaching science has treated the issue of education for citizenship in terms of teaching methods, curricular proposals, content selection and the teachers´ representations in respect to the meaning of the term education for citizenship (SANTOS e SCHNETZLER, 1996; PRAIA, GIL-PEREZ e VILCHES, 2007; SANTOS, 2007). In this work, the attempt is to approach the theme from another perspective, proposed by the narrative inquiry. In the educational research, the narrative approach to teachers´ knowledge identifies itself with the comprehensive, interpretive and interactional studies (BORGES, 2001). It is an epistemological approach which understands the experience as a means in which human beings present themselves in relation to reality (CLANDININ e ROSIEK, 2006) and, consequently, takes narratives not only as the phenomena intended to investigate, but also as a research method. The theoretical reference for the comprehension of the teachers´ professional knowledge founded itself in concepts of practical personal knowledge and of professional knowledge landscape (CLANDININ e CONNELLY, 1995). Classroom observations, interviews and informal conversations with the participants, with or without the help of a digital register using a recorder, were methods used for the account and register of stories. Narrative accounts were composed and shared with the participants for the analysis of data, in which it was intended to identify the narrative unities comprehended as elements which allowed to unify as a whole, the stories told by the teachers. The results point out as to how the teachers´ dilemmas relate themselves to their practical personal knowledge and their professional development landscape, indicating how the context assumes a relevant role in the experience of these dilemmas. As possible contributions to this investigation, these results allow a further complex analysis of the teaching in science and education for citizenship theme, giving indication of transforming movements and resistance in teaching practice, frequently analyzed partially by other theoretical-methodological approaches, and how in these movements, actuates the teachers´ professional knowledge landscape.