Educação antiopressiva no ensino de evolução: uma sequência didática baseada em Clémence Royer

Abstract

Despite a relative increase, in recent decades, of research that focuses on teaching biology that goes beyond a scientism and an excessive emphasis on concepts, we still notice an important gap in the proposition of educational strategies that cover the socio-political and cultural issues that surround and impact us. This apolitical or uncritical bias in biology teaching contributes to the perpetuation of outdated and stereotyped views (of science, knowledge production, human beings, social groups, etc.) that can reinforce oppressive patterns. In this sense, it is important to draw attention to the importance of teacher training in biology, aimed at preparing subjects who act critically and engaged in society, especially if we take into account the socio-political context we have been living in recent years and the growing fascist wave that we have been experiencing in Brazil. Therefore, supported by social and legal demands regarding the promo- tion of educational actions aimed at combating oppression, especially racism and sexism, based on the theoretical perspective of Freire-hookian pedagogy and the theoretical-methodological framework of research in Design Educational, This research aimed to investigate and validate a didactic sequence (SD), within the scope of teaching biological evolution, based on the intellectual trajectory of the Frenchwoman Clémence Royer, with the intention of promoting critical training in the dynamics of oppression to be implemented in a class of the degree course in Biological Sciences at the State University of Feira de Santana – UEFS. More specifically, we aim to: (1) investigate the intellectual trajectory of Frenchwoman and science woman Clémence Royer, as a resource for articulating the history of science (in this case, the history of women in science) and science teaching; (2) develop and validate design principles for this DS and (3) validate the didactic sequence by peers and the feminist social movement. From a qualitative approach, we started this investigation seeking to contemplate the preliminary phase, in which we proceeded with the analysis of the context that culminated in the elaboration of a conceptual framework based on the literature and teaching knowledge that guided the entire research. Then, we proceeded to the prototyping phase, when the didactic intervention was elaborated, and the validation processes by peers and the feminist movement, in addition to the investigation of design principles, empirically tested in the real context of the classroom. A cycle of prototyping with formative evaluation was carried out, which signaled the need to re-elaborate strategies with the aim of improving the intervention, mainly in relation to the limits of design principles. The empirical results point to the validation of the investigated principles and to the potential of the DS as a whole. As for the use of Clémence Royer's intellectual trajectory, we found great potential in the history of this woman of science in promoting debates related to the social implications of evolutionism, in the path of developing critical thinking to the dynamics of oppression by students, results that demonstrate the educational theoretical contributions and to the history of science area of this thesis. Based on these results, we developed an educative curriculum material (ECM) as an educational resource based on the educational products of this study: the principles, the DS and the public library of anti-oppressive education. In addition, we hope that this research will contribute to the biology teaching literature and inspire the development of new research that will present educational innovations that seek to articulate the specific contents of biology with socially relevant themes, with the objective of promoting a contextualized, problematizing and anti-oppressive education.