Mediação didática na formação continuada de professores em ambientes virtuais de aprendizagem

Abstract

This paper aims to analyze how the didactic mediation in online learning environments happens, as well as the way in which the teacher intervenes in the relationship of the student with the knowledge in the continuing education of teachers in a specialization course. Specifically, it intends to identify and analyze the conception of the teachers in the process of continuing education on the didactic mediation in distance education (DE) as well as to describe how the use of tools in virtual learning environments (VLE) occurs, with the purpose of understanding how these tools can permit the interaction among different subjects in the VLE. From this, the objective is to investigate the didactic interventions originated from the use of technologies in VLE, analyzing the didactic mediation, their characteristics and contribution in the construction of knowledge by teachers in continuing education process. The object of study is built on three themes, namely: distance education, continuing education of teachers and the teaching mediation. It was opted for a qualitative study, on the grounds of conceptions of Lüdke and André (1986) and Chizzotti (2000). The theoretical framework that allowed us to understand the conceptual dimension of the problem studied account mainly with Peters (2001, 2012), Moore and Kearsley (2013), Lenoir (2011), Toschi (2010), Libâneo (2001, 2005), Saviani (2009), Candau (2008, 2012), Belloni (2001), D'Avila (2002), Nóvoa (1991, 1999), Harasim et al (2005) and Alonso (2010). Data collection happened in a course of specialization whose main target public were education professionals. The instruments used were half-open questionnaires directed to course participants and the academic course advisers, as well as observation through virtual ethnography, guided by studies of Hine (2005) and Gutierrez (2009). Data analysis followed the technique of content analysis, as directed by Franco (2005). The analysis categories solidified into three namely: a) the time and the distance education; b) the teaching mediation; and c) the interactivity. The analysis of these categories showed that the didactic mediation is not a dominant reality in the virtual learning environment yet. It infers, therefore, that the didactic mediation exercised by the teacher in distance is from their own convictions about what interaction, mediation and organization of an online learning environment is. Therefore, it is not equally exercised by all those who act in distance education (DE), since the choice for didactic organization and the interventions made by them are not consensual. It still infers that the lack of institutionalization of distance education does not allow the ripening of good teaching practices. In this sense, exercising the teaching mediation in VLE demands the teacher's in distance attitude and effort from their own didactic and methodological principles.