Banca de DEFESA: Diego Andres Barrios Díaz

Childhood, pandemic, and education: Experiences and spatialities
of children amid the crisis

Children; Childhood; Covid-19; Perezhivanie; Cultural Historical Theory

This thesis aims to analyze the experiences of children in the Federal District in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, during the period of social isolation imposed by the virus and in the context of the return to in-person school activities. The work arises from the recognition that the gaps imposed by the pandemic context posed threats to the lives of children in different social, historical, and geographical positions. It is understood that children establish original relationships with space. Different theoretical approaches are articulated to give visibility to children’s participation as subjects of knowledge. The empirical fieldwork was carried out in two different schools in the Federal District, located in urban and rural areas. The methodology consisted of creating listeningdialogue spaces that allowed for the production of spatial representations narrating what children felt and experienced during the pandemic. Experiential Maps constitute the central instrument for producing information in this methodological approach. The analyses indicate that children reinvented their spatial practices during the pandemic as part of a creative reelaboration process of space, its dynamics, and meanings