Interdisciplinaridade com Galperin: formação continuada de professores do ensino médio da área de ciências naturais

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate how teachers’ continuing education influences the development and implementation of Interdisciplinary Didactic Sequences (IDS) aligned with P. Ya. Galperin’s theory. The research followed a qualitative, applied, and interpretative approach, guided by the action-research-training method (Charlier, 2008), and initially involved 20 participants, including 17 teachers and 3 school coordinators, all from the Natural Sciences area in public high schools in Cascavel, Ceará, Brazil. The process was carried out in three phases: (1) diagnosis, accompanied by the planning of the training process involving all participants; (2) continuing education, with the participation of 16 remaining professionals; and (3) implementation, in which 2 teachers applied an IDS previously developed during the continuing education phase. Data were collected through questionnaires, interviews, and observation, and analyzed using categorical content analysis (Bardin, 2016). The results indicated that continuing education, when focused on critical reflection and collective engagement, constitutes an effective strategy to overcome curricular fragmentation in the field. It also supports the development of Galperin-based IDS with clear objectives, fosters collaboration among educators, and promotes a theoretical-practical articulation grounded in the school reality. Furthermore, this type of professional development encourages cooperation between teachers and school coordinators. However, implementing an interdisciplinary culture, as proposed by the training, faces structural challenges (limited time, bureaucratic overload, conflicting schedules, and insufficient resources and infrastructure), institutional constraints (lack of support, fragmented initial training, and inadequate teaching materials), and cultural resistance from some teachers. The main contributions of this study are both theoretical and practical: theoretically, it establishes a link between P. Ya. Galperin’s theory and the principles of interdisciplinarity in teacher continuing education, resulting in a didactic-methodological framework for integrated Natural Sciences teaching; practically, it presents a replicable continuing education approach for developing Galperin-based IDS, adaptable to different school contexts, while highlighting the strategic role of the school management team in creating conditions for promoting similar pedagogical practices.