The vocational course in Portugal appeared to give an answer to specific students’ needs that searched an alternative to regular studies. In 1989 it is performed for the first time in professional schools and in 2004 made part of the school courses in public schools. It appeared in a traditional educational system inherited from a school that in the second half of the 22th century opened the doors to all the students, becoming an influenced school effect of the need to give an answer to “factory” challenges. The elite schooling gave place to the massed one marked by acquiring knowledge through the traditional system organized in transmission that predominated in Portuguese school. The inclusion of professional course in public schools aimed, with other courses, to help in the increasing of basic Portuguese students’ school skill and fulfill the European Commission objective to give academic skills to 85% of the young students with 22 years old (in, Iniciativas Novas Oportunidades, 2005). However, the professional teaching wasn’t always a successful way, promoter of inclusion. Many times, it was seen as second teaching opportunities, which led to stigmatic students who attend it, considered as the most unmotivated, the incapable, the undisciplined. The tax of professional teaching application has increased in public schools since its appearance in 2004/05 with 36 765 students to 114 848 in 2014/15 (DGEEC, 2016). Nevertheless the conclusion rate has been occurred variations, leading some students to leave school after being 18 years old, without finishing their studies as determined in Law number 85/2009 of 27th August. The professional courses mustn’t be perceived as a teaching for the ones who don’t want it or don’t know, but as an offer delineated to the success of all students and of each one, that is different from the other one, due to the individuality of being “I” and by the willing of wanting to know how “to do” it. When we build an inclusive school it’s needed to accept the challenge of perceiving and knowing different processes and ways of teaching and students will feel recognized, respected and willing to learn. Our studies focused on a school where the professional courses are offered with asocial, cultural and economical disadvantaged background and with a school population with few academic future prospects. With this work we want to study the pedagogic model adopted by teachers who teach in professional classes and practices which lead to an individual and differentiated teaching, able to motivate students to new learning skills. In our investigation, we decided to use as gathering data, documental analyse, using the legislation, the school structural documents, the School Educational Project, the Professional Class Projects. We did interviews through Focus Group to some school actors who occupy the places of school in study every day. The interviewed groups were formed by eight students of the professional courses, two teachers, two directors and a course director with teaching responsibility and pedagogical responsibilities in professional classes. In conclusion, our work allows us to infer if there are some teachers who proceed with traditional practices that mark an elitist teaching of transmission the bookish knowledge. Students desire innovator teachers who love the profession and the art of teaching not to “all as they were one”, but to each one as learning human beings with the duty to practices which respect the individual learning rhythm and the student being.
Date of Award | 12 Mar 2018 |
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Original language | Portuguese |
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Awarding Institution | - Universidade Católica Portuguesa
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Supervisor | Ilídia Cabral (Supervisor) |
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- Professional teaching
- Modular structure
- Pedagogical differentiation
- Educational success
- Mestrado em Ciências da Educação
Ensino profissional: um percurso de diferenciação pedagógica
Ferreira, M. M. P. D. A. (Student). 12 Mar 2018
Student thesis: Master's Thesis