Ensino religioso nas escolas e as suas representações

The aim of this research is to investigate teachers’ views of religious education and access their knowledge about this discipline. 53 teachers from six municipal schools in the city of Santos, São Paulo, participated in the research project. The study is based on the theory of social representations developed by Serge Moscovici and its methodology is made up of three instruments: the word association test, a drawing with title and justifi cation and a projective questionnaire. The data of the word association test were analysed using the software EVOC, following the studies by Vergès. The data of the drawing and the projective questionnaire were treated through the content analysis proposed by Bardin. The results show that the representations are possibly rooted in the idea of catechesis and its history in Brazil. It was also possible to observe changes in the representations of religious education in public schools. Elements such as area of knowledge and social function have been added to the representation, probably due to public policies, legislations and debates on this issue.