A proposta curricular para o ensino fundamental de nove anos e a prática docente: um estudo sobre a Rede Municipal de Juiz de Fora

Abstract

This research paper aims to analyze the impact of the Curriculum Propositions for municipal schools in the city of Juiz de Fora on the work of primary education teachers, exploring how their works is being arranged, organized and performed within one of these schools, considered to provide quality education. The objective is to identify transformations and permanencies occurred in the teaching practice after the elaboration and publication of the new Curricular Propositions. A case study was carried out with the observation of school routines inside and outside the classroom, document analysis and interviews for data collection. The paper debates some issues based on studies on curricular and educational policies. For the analysis, it makes use of the primary contexts of the policy cycle approach developed by Richard Bowe, Stephen Ball and Anne Gold, namely the contexts of influence, the text production context and particularly the practice context. As a theoretical reference, it used the contributions of Chevallard, Giroux, Gimeno Sacristán, Moreira, Nóvoa, Silva and Young. The analyses indicate the participation of teachers in the elaboration of the Curricular Propositions, as occurred within other governmental bodies. However, given the inexistence of further measures supporting the implementation of the Curricular Propositions, the study identified great vulnerability in the guarantee of its execution, which eventually exerted even more influence in the way teachers interpret and build significance about the curricular text. The Curricular Proposition document demonstrates its own potentialities and weaknesses. It is possible to identify the naturalization of controlling strategies aimed at monitoring results from external assessment. There is also data indicating that pedagogical planning has been the main resource for reflections concerning the Curricular Propositions and that this process has been the most important one in strengthening teachers’ autonomy and subsidizing actions focused on changes in the educational practice. The autonomy of teachers has been preserved, fostered by pre-existing curricular knowledge and previous educational experiences, which enables the teacher to function as the greatest influencer of classroom practice, followed by the Curricular Propositions and didactic books, in that order. Nevertheless, it is still necessary to re-elaborate the curricular propositions and encourage greater efforts by the Educational Secretariat regarding the support to teachers in their work with the Curricular Propositions, especially considering the complexity of the classroom environment.