AT SCHOOL . 2017
Learning to Study guides 4th and 5th-grade teachers in analyzing the content and structure of History and Science texts, as well as implementing reading activities that help children learn disciplinary content and become more familiar with the language used to represent it.
In 2017, we produced four exemplar didactic sequences to expand the resources available to teachers when studying and planning their lessons based on our methodology. The sequences model the incremental complexity of both in-class proposals and learning objectives, as students transition from 4th to 5th-grade.
From August to November, we documented the use of these complementary materials by one 4th-grade teacher from a Castanheira municipal school (MT), first with support from a Laboratório de Educação instructor and later in a semi-autonomous manner.
During this pilot, Learning to Study successfully introduced a new way of “reading to learn” about History, which increased lessons’ depth while promoting more active learning opportunities for students. However, we also identified that teachers need to experience constructive learning processes themselves in order to effectively and autonomously relate to our proposals. The future of Learning to Study will likely require continued professional development processes that integrate not only the study of the proposal’s theoretical underpinnings, but also the analysis of how they are put into action in real classrooms.