Temáticas ambientais no ensino fundamental: materiais curriculares de ciências e saberes docentes

Abstract

Environmental issues can be taught from different perspectives in basic education. The objective of this study was to understand how environmental issues are addressed in teaching materials from Rio de Janeiro and in knowledge mobilized for teaching, aiming at the elaboration of an educational product with alternative didactic-pedagogical activities for teachers of basic education and students at elementary school. The relevance of the research takes place in the context in which socio-environmental issues often are not in educational materials and practices in elementary education. This is a predominantly qualitative research with: mapping of articles in Portal Scielo - Brasil (1998-2019) and theses and dissertations in Portal CAPES (2013-2019); analysis of Science curriculum documents - Curriculum Guidelines (OC, 2016), Review of Curriculum Guidelines (ROC, 2018) and Science Curriculum (C, 2020); Science curriculum materials – Pedagogical Notebook (CP, 2018) and Carioca Didactic Material (MDC, 2019-2020) from SME-RJ; application of a questionnaire to 30 teachers and conducting interviews with five teachers who teach Science. A total of 79 articles were selected, grouped into 11 thematic axes: teaching - learning (15); teaching methodologies (14); resume (8); Environmental Education (12); teacher training (7); CTS and CTSA (6); conception, perception and representation (2), (4), (2) respectively; scientific literacy (3); textbook (3); interdisciplinarity (2) and literature review (1). The twelve dissertations and two theses in the selected teaching area were grouped into five thematic axes: teaching methodologies (5); pedagogical practices (2); Environmental Education (2) and EE linked to science teaching (1); learning (2) and curriculum (2). The analysis of Science curriculum materials indicated that environmental issues are related to ecological and biological contents, without involving human, social, historical, political, economic, and cultural aspects. Environmental themes lost space in curricular materials between 2018 and 2020. The analysis indicated that most teachers reported having used curricular materials frequently and to guide pedagogical work, depending on external assessments. Conservationist and pragmatic perspectives of Environmental Education (EE) were signaled in the analysis of the responses of twenty-eight teachers and eleven participants indicated training in EE during initial and/or continuing education. Teachers indicated little involvement of the team in the organization and continuity of activities with environmental themes in schools. The educational product brings together nine didactic-pedagogical activities articulating environmental and teaching knowledge and four of these activities were applied to five teachers participating in the research and twenty-seven students. The evaluation indicated that the activities help in the problematization of environmental issues, with the possibility of application in other training spaces. The activities contributed to the construction of school knowledge and to the involvement of students in educational actions in a critical and reflective way.