A Perfect Learning Day: Perceptions of Secondary School Students about the Ideal School

Valentim, Sandra; Freire, Carla

http://hdl.handle.net/10400.8/5234

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Authors

Valentim, Sandra

Freire, Carla

Abstract(s)

The technological evolution of recent years has opened doors to new challenges in several fields. In Education, more than ever, it seems necessary to develop educational processes that keep the students’ interest in the classroom. These students seem increasingly distant from teachers, unaware, highly motivated to use technologies and needy of active strategies that allow them to remain encouraged to learn. The present research emerged from the difficulty in feeling students engaged in classes and the need to understand the reasons of this demotivation, which leads many students to indiscipline and school failure. An opportunity arose to collaborate in a research project on pedagogical practices and innovative learning environments, the DELLI Project. This was the mobile for the elaboration of a diagnosis, whose purpose was to perceive what would be an ideal day of classes for secondary school students. The study objectives were to identify the students’ perceptions regarding the idealized school and to contribute with suggestions of improvement of teaching practices, in order to identify the difficulties felt in the classroom and other areas where one can intervene improving learning. The research was based on the Qualitative Paradigm and on a descriptive study, anchored in assumptions of a Design Thinking model. The diagnosis was made at two public schools, where data was collected through a non-formal instrument, to encourage free responses appealing to critical ability to anonymously express perceptions regarding what students believe to be a perfect school day. A content analysis was performed in search for answers in the words of the participants. It was concluded that an ideal school day for these students implies the accomplishment of some changes in teaching-learning strategies. Changes related to flexibility, both in terms of timetables and classroom spaces, and especially in the way of being, in the ability of teachers’ openness and accompaniment to the way in which their students are taught. We hope this study contributes to an evolution in the performance of schools and teachers, leading to an approximation of what students see as an Ideal School.