Sentidos e significados de professores de matemática : estudo sobre um processo de formação continuada em um município sergipano

Abstract

This work presents the results of a master's research, whose objective was to analyze the senses and meanings that mathematics teachers build in a process of continuing education through mathematics workshops. Therefore, the locus of our research is part of an extension project resulting from a partnership between the Federal University of Sergipe and some municipal public education networks in this state. This project has been developed since 2017, offering continuing education to teachers who teach mathematics in these networks, through five monthly meetings. The activities developed are carried out with teaching sequences that, in addition to meeting the guidelines of the National Common Base Curriculum, also promote an articulation between geometry and the other fields of mathematics. The emphasis on these contents is justified by the issue of the problem of teaching geometry, pointed out by different researches since the 1990s, as a result of the gap in teacher education. As we followed this project as collaborators, some questions arose giving rise to our research question: What are the senses and meanings constructed by the teachers participating in the Mathematics Workshops during their participation in this training process? Therefore, we limited our research to only one of the four partner cities in this project, the municipality of Itabaianinha-SE. The methodology used is characterized in an exploratory descriptive perspective, being characterized as action research. For data collection, questionnaires, logbook, concept maps, interviews and group discussions were used. As a theoretical contribution, this study is based on the Theory of the Relationship with Knowledge, through which participating teachers are studied as a set of relationships that they establish with themselves, with others and with the world. In line with the methodological assumptions of the theory that underlies this study, it was possible to identify three “Constellations of Meaning”, which together constituted a “Network of Constellations”. As a result, the Network was established based on three Constellations: Learning, construction and renewal of knowledge; Mobilization for continuing education; Demystification of learning and teaching Geometry. When analyzing these Constellations, we can see the overlap of the three dimensions of the Relationship with knowledge (epistemic, social and identity), which reveal the senses and meanings constructed by teachers, during the formative process. Among them, the epistemic dimension stands out with greater expressiveness, which is sustained by means of three epistemic processes, characterized in our study as figures of learning to teach. The Constellation Network also points to a fragile relationship of significance established by teachers with teaching geometry, corroborating with other research already developed in this perspective. Finally, this study shows that continuing education programs developed in a perspective of articulation between theory and practice can be conceived as a good opportunity for teacher professional development. Likewise, we highlight the importance of new research on the theme of continuing education for teachers who teach mathematics, especially in relation to the teaching of geometric objects, pointing out new ways to overcome the challenges encountered by teachers in relation to the teaching of these contents.