Abstract
Nowadays information is processed quickly, and it provides new ways of interaction between the students and the teachers. The digital learning process has entered in our schools and has also brought a great discussion: how to teach in the digital age. To answer it, the authors aim to present a case study about the teacher training program developed in a blended model. Its purpose was to support the teaching practices and to rethink the learning spaces as well as to generate reflections on the issues of how to evaluate the application of active methodologies which are used in the basic education. A total of 20 teachers from four private schools in São Paulo have completed the training program. Thus, it enabled considerable advances in the planning of active classes. It was noticed, according to the results, that the teaching methodologies represent a challenge to be overcome in new training programs.
TopIntroduction
Today's society has been suffering significant changes in social, political, economic and cultural contexts, which cause changes in personal values and beliefs. Colossi et al. (2001) identify these global changes as a sense of the “new millennium”, marked by information, globalization and the knowledge society, characterizing, thus, the modern world. All of these changes cause a technological expansion which leads to a new generation considered to be digital native. These people are used to receive information very quickly. This transformation of the communicative process is largely due to digital networks (Prensky, 2001; Castells, 2007).
All the technological evolution, which has already been used, has arrived at educational institutions and has also changed the format of the old teaching model to new teaching models face-to-face (F2F), distance and/or blended learning (DL /BL). Taking in consideration that some authors defend the distinction between DL and Distance Education (DE) (King, Young, Drivere-Richmond & Schrader, 2004), a view not aligned with other authors (Sherry, 1995), for disambiguation purposes, it should be noted this chapter will use the terms interchangeably. The DL in the basic education, for example, assumes that the student will be able to learn at any time regardless of where he/she is. For Jackiw (2019),
[...] It has been a concern on the part of governments, in their different spheres, to bring different technological devices into schools as a way of “connecting” the dynamic and borderless world of contemporary society and the school’s encyclopedic world (p. 02)
On the other hand, it is possible to identify many school initiatives which have started to challenge themselves to promote new learning experiences for their students. They include in their program classes of robotics, critical thinking, programming, socio-emotional skills and among other competences which are necessary for citizens to live in society today.
In the Brazilian schools there is a lack of new studies to support teachers in the planning of their classes which can help in the construction of this teaching and learning process. This fact is corroborated by the studies of Gemignani (2013), under the statement that there is a growing search for innovative methodologies which enable a pedagogical practice capable of overcoming the limits of purely technical and traditional training, to effectively achieve the formation of the individual as an ethical, historical, critical, reflective, transformative and humanized being.
The use of computers, the Internet and other digital devices in Brazilian schools are becoming more and more common. Despite of this, its pedagogical use is still not as efficient as it could be. Many teachers find it difficult to deal with technology, while students are not intimidated by digital devices. Education professionals should be aware that the use of digital tools does not bring the innovation which is expected if it is not accompanied by new teaching-learning methodologies and, especially, by a new attitude of the teacher (Gemignani, 2013 ; Bates, 2016; Iannone et al., 2016). In addition, it seems that investments on infrastructure (learning spaces, technologies, the Internet) and on teacher training programs are reserved for private educational institutions.
Connected to this scenario, the impact of digital transformation reaches education, promoting countless institutional changes, in particular, pedagogical models to meet the demands coming from the student’s profile and the application of projects which can give greater visibility to the participation of parents in understanding the proposals of combined classes between studying at home (online) and at school (in person). An illustration of this is the rupture of the conventional model of teaching with the exploration and experiment of Active Methods. For Silberman (1996), the research shows that active learning is a very effective teaching strategy; students assimilate a greater volume of content, retain information for longer and enjoy classes with more satisfaction and pleasure.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Frayer Model: Is a graphic organizer used for building and analyzing vocabulary. This type of pedagogical activity that helps the student to record what he knows or has learned about a certain subject.
Poster Walk: Active methodology (unknown authorship) that consists of the presentation of works by students, in poster format. Each group presents the works distributed in the classroom spaces, students walk around the room to follow and take notes on the topics presented.
Word Café: Methodology that was thought and idealized by Juanita Brown and David Isaacs in 1995. This methodology consists of a creative process that aims to generate dialogues between individuals.
10 Plus 2: It is a collaborative teaching approach in which after 10 minutes of lecture, the student has 2 minutes of discussion in small groups.
Learning Experience Platform: New generation of virtual learning environments that aims to deepen and improve the learning experience in online teaching.
Peer Instruction: Active methodology developed by Harvard University professor Eric Mazur, which is based on statistical data on student performance during classes.
Learning by Doing: It is a practical learning approach developed by John Dewey, which aims to create learning situations for students to interact with the environment to adapt and learn.
Microlearnings: Study content divided into small parts called knowledge pills. It is used in order to reduce cognitive overload in the student's learning process.
COVID-19: Disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, which presents a state of health ranging from asymptomatic infections to severe respiratory conditions. This disease is the cause of the pandemic started in the year 2020.
DigCompEdu instrument (The European Digital Competence Framework): It is a study that describes what it means for educators to be digitally competent. It provides a general frame of reference to support the development of specific digital competencies for educators in Europe.