Teacher education and chemistry teaching: reflections on the book Serões de Dona Benta by Monteiro Lobato and the pedagogy of Paulo Freire

Abstract

This work discusses the pedagogical style of Monteiro Lobato, based on the reading of his body of children’s literature, especially Serões de Dona Benta, with the aim of identifying excerpts where specific approaches to chemistry knowledge appear in the light of the pedagogy of Paulo Freire. The notions of question-asking pedagogy, epistemological curiosity and knowledge necessary for the education of a critical and reflective teacher are highlighted, with a view to showing the contributions that the relationships between literature and sciences can bring to chemistry teaching. Our analysis states that the science presented by Dona Benta exemplifies a teacher that goes beyond a discussion that is strictly centered on the specificity of science or concepts of chemistry. This is done by means of question-asking pedagogy, revealing that Serões de Dona Benta presents a potential that can be used to problematize questions as regards teaching practice. Dona Benta, for example, makes clear that educating is not training and teaching is not only transferring content. She uses dialog and problematization of the doubt and curiosity as a methodological option.