Análises dos sistemas de atividade docente de dois professores de ciências no Brasil e Espanha

Abstract

The present research make an analysis of the teaching activity of two senior science teachers in two primary schools in Seville, Spain and Recife, Brazil, looking for elements that may influence the development of their educational practice at this level of education and identifying which are the actions they perform in order to achieve the desired results of their activity as teachers. For the construction of the analysis we use Activity Theory in its most recent version developed by Engeström (1999), because we believe that it is powerful enough to reveal relevant data about the context, culture and the rest of elements that are part of the teacher's activity. The choice of this analyses tool provided the opportunity to assess how adequate it appears to be for understanding the teaching activity in a broader way, taking into account each of the factors that participate and influence this practice. The analysis of the teaching activity of science teachers from the activity Theory allowed us to construct a system of activity of each teacher in which we can observe what the mediating elements in their practice are and how they relate to each of the elements to build the activity. In addition, this framework makes possible to distinguish which minor activities make up the teaching activity and which actions and operations the teacher conducts directed towards the objectives of their activity. Although our research does not intend to be a comparative study, since both study subjects are very different contexts and natures, through the referential we could juxtapose the systems of teaching activity in order to draw conclusions about the influence of culture, context and the mediating artefacts in the teaching practice of teachers. For example, it was possible to observe how the difference of contexts determined the available tools in the classroom, while professor of Spain had a wide variety of technological resources, Brazil's teacher had none.