The teaching of natural sciences in curricula for teacher education programs

Abstract

The objective of this study was to analyze how knowledge related to the teaching of natural sciences is organized in the syllabi of the curricular components of on-campus bachelor’s degree programs in Education at the Federal Universities of Rio Grande do Sul. This is a qualitative, exploratory, descriptive, and documentary study. The corpus consisted of 13 syllabi for courses related to the natural sciences. The documents were examined for their program content, methodological strategies, and assessment processes using thematic analysis, which was predominantly deductive and semantic in nature. The results revealed a broad educational framework comprising scientific and epistemological knowledge, socio-environmental issues, and sociocultural themes related to the body, health, gender, sexuality, diversity, and human rights. The methodological strategies include expository-reflective, investigative, theoretical-practical, and pedagogical production activities. Assessment processes combine written instruments, ongoing monitoring, and pedagogical productions, revealing an emphasis on conceptual mastery, reflection, participation, planning, and teacher agency. From the interplay among these dimensions, four training strands emerged: scientific and epistemological training, socio-environmental training, sociocultural training, and didactic-pedagogical training. It can be concluded that these programs aim to train educators capable of integrating scientific, socio-environmental, and sociocultural knowledge into the curricular and pedagogical decisions inherent to teaching. This training seeks to familiarize teacher candidates with practices of reflection, research, planning, and pedagogical production, although its effectiveness depends on the integration of conceptual mastery and pedagogical knowledge.