Temáticas ambientais na universidade e seus agentes na formação de professores.

Abstract

Debates on Environmental Education (EE), in the contemporary world, are related to problems generated in/to the environment in the most varied sectors of society. However, the way the discussions are carried out lead to different understandings about the intentionality of EE. In the educational sphere, EE is established by regulatory documents as mandatory at all levels of education, with the aim of promoting reflections on the relationship between society and nature. Considering the influence of teachers in training people, in the present work we seek to understand which elements constitute the teaching identity in relation to the environmental theme of teacher trainers in a public university in the western region of Paraná. To develop the work, we used the snowball sampling technique to build our sample and, as research instruments, a sociocultural questionnaire and semi-structured interviews. The technique employed allows to gather participants considered significant by their peers, which resulted in a sample of six participants, all of them from the Biological Sciences course. The data analysis methodology was Grounded Theory (GT), according to Charmaz constructivist perspective, which revealed elements of the participants' environmental perception with mixed characteristics, transiting between a conservative, pragmatic and critical perspective of EE, which justifies due to the complexity of the human being. With regard to the construction of the teaching identity, this is formed by experiences obtained over time and space, with a strong influence on previous and family pedagogical experiences. The experiences present in the initial and post-graduate training of the interviewed professors, considered successful by them, are reflected in the development of teaching practice, which promotes environmental discussions for the analysis of ecological interactions, disregarding cultural and socioeconomic contexts. In general, teachers indicate that there is resistance and insecurity for the inclusion of EE in their activities, due to weaknesses in their educational process. In this sense, it is necessary to encourage initial and continuing training on EE, so that all teachers are confident in the development of their work and in conducting reflections on the relationship between society and nature, allowing discourses that encompass environmental complexity in teacher training courses that go beyond the vision of EE as an area of Biological Sciences.