A visão das crianças sobre sua participação no contexto escolar: a vez e a voz da infância

Abstract

This research aims to investigate how a group of children understand and execute their participation in a public primary school in Manaus. Considering that this kind of participation in public spaces has been discussed more and more by researchers fighting for the rights of children. Therefore, we performed a qualitative and interpretative research, based on the triangulation of methods which emphasizes a dialectic construction to understand the phenomena, trough the combination and crossing of multiples points of view, instruments, and other areas of knowledge. Thus, starting with participant observation and a systematic record in a field diary, we perceived, as months went by, a lack of children participation in school due to the established power relations that submit them to a strict institutional hierarchy. In ten small focus groups, we created a space where the children could express their ideas and feelings, through dialogue and drawings, about how they see their participation in school. We found out that almost all of those children didn t see themselves as having rights at school; and they even proposed the use of punitive and controlling systems (similar to those employed by the school itself) to deal with problem children . Through digital and artisanal photography workshops, we created a mechanism for the children to play and modify their participation at school; by shooting pictures of what they liked the most in the school environment. All procedures have been helpful to allow us to compare, analyze, and interpret their actions and speech about children participation in the institutional context. Employing historic-cultural psychology and critic pedagogy we concluded that the school is too far removed from contributing to the subjective autonomy of the children. Nowadays, their biggest concern is not to live the present day, nor to question the school system, but only to hope for a better future when they will grow up and, finally, be considered someone . Today they are no one , just mere students