Formação de profissionais de educação infantil no ensino superior: uma reflexão acerca das contribuições das pesquisas científicas para se repensar essa formação (2000 – 2013)

Abstract

This investigation is associated to the Alagoas Federal University’s childhood Education and Human Development Research Group (Grupo de Pesquisa Educação Infantil e Desenvolvimento Humano da Universidade Federal de Alagoas), under the supervision of Professor Dr. Lenira Haddad. It has the objective to research and analyze the academic production related to the training of a professional of Early Child Education (ECE) at the higher education. Therefore, we sought to answer the following questions: what is the place of early childhood education in the curriculum of basic training at higher education level? What are the strengths and challenges to be overcome encountered in the researches? Is it possible to identify similar aspects or significant changes after analyzing the surveys conducted before and after the validity of DCNCP (2006 ) with regard to the demands necessary for the education of young children ? A mapping was completed of theses and dissertations on the subject of “formation of a profesional of early-childhood education” from a search made on the following databases: CAPES, Biblioteca Digital Brasileira de Teses e Dissertações/USP, Biblioteca Digital da UNICAMP, Biblioteca digital da UNESP, Associação Nacional de Pós Graduação e Pesquisa em Educação-ANPEd, UFSC - Biblioteca Universitária, SCIELO e Domínio Público: Biblioteca Digital do MEC. The retrieval of the dissertations, theses and articles’ titles, which span the period from 2000 to 2013, was done based on the following descriptors: Professional training, earlychildhood education, early-childhood education professor preparation, initial training, Pedagogy, Higher Education course. Twelve studies were selected on the basis of having a greater proximity to the subject of initial training in higher education (classroom mode). These surveys cover a range of thirty higher education institutions which offer training for professional Early Childhood Education. The analyses and discussion of the results was structured in two dimensions. The first concerns the contribution of the theses and dissertations in the training of the professor of early-childhood education, in which is discussed the training courses from the research that analyzed the documents that structured the courses and from the researches that gave voice to the subjects: teachers, students and early-childhood education professional graduated in Pedagogy. The second dimension examines two aspects that concern the specificity of early childhood education: the opposition between elementary education and early-childhood education, Infancy’s Pedagogy or Pedagogy of Early-Childhood Education. As a result of this investigation it is clear that Early-Childhood Education professionals training did not undergo significant changes, especially with regards to the legitimacy of the education of young children in the training courses for teachers. It is understood as the main challenges to overcome: a) the lack of identity and character of hyper-training identified in the training courses , b) the absence of disciplinary components that promote discussions regarding the education of young children c ) gaps presented by Pedagogy courses’ teachers in respect of the relevant knowledge to ECE d) predominance of school model in the structure of Pedagogy courses e) disciplinary logic present in the academies of the country and its incompatibility with the necessary learning of early-childhood. We can infer that there is an urgent need to overcome the school model that guides the organization of the training courses for teachers in the country and to move towards legitimizing Early Childhood Pedagogy appropriate to the specific manner in which the child constructs an understanding of themselves and the World. However, this Early-Childhood pedagogy needs to be better understood and deciphered. Furthermore, it is understandable that, as the school model was spread in the areas of training of professional practices in the ECE institutions, the creation of areas of information and training from a model that reflects the identity, function and organization of ECE with the perspective of the rights and needs of the child can change the course of training of ECE in our country.