Passive Constructions in Brazilian Portuguese: Investigative Teaching, Descriptive Results, and the Development of Didactic Guidelines

Abstract

This article reports on an experience of investigative grammar teaching focused on the analysis of passive constructions in Brazilian Portuguese. The experience was developed in a course at Faculdade de Letras da UFMG, within the research project “Da pesquisa linguística à prática docente: ensino investigativo de gramática com o VerboWeb 3.0 (PQ/CNPq)”. The aim is to show how an investigative methodology can lead pre-service teachers to observe real data, apply syntactic-semantic tests, consult VerboWeb 3.0, and formulate generalizations about complex grammatical phenomena. Four types of passive constructions were analyzed: analytic or eventive passive, synthetic passive, adjectival, resultative passive, and adjectival stative passive. The results show that passivization in Brazilian Portuguese cannot be explained solely by formal criteria, since it also involves argument structure, thematic roles, lexical aspect, semantic restrictions, and discourse effects. As an outcome of the experience, the descriptive results were transformed into didactic guidelines for basic education, to be made available on GramáticaWeb. The article argues that grammar teaching can be organized as an investigative practice, bringing together linguistic research, teacher education, and the production of accessible teaching materials.