CHALLENGES IN THE EDUCATION OF YOUTH AND ADULTS IN TIMES OF A PANDEMIC: KNOWLEDGE AND STRATEGIES CONSTITUTED IN TEACHING ACTION.
teaching knowledge; education in the context of Covid 19; teacher training in youth and adult education; self-training
This work seeks to understand, from the knowledge constituted in the teaching action, the challenges faced by educators in the education of young people and adults, and the overcoming strategies developed from their pedagogical action in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic. Theoretical support is given by André (2013); Wachowicz (2001); Kopnin (1879); Gamboa (2008); Arroyo (2017); Bauer and Gaskell (2008); Bourdieu (2008, 2015); Fontana (2010); Freire (1996, 2018); Galvão (2019); Haddad and Di Pierro (1994); Machado (1998, 2000, 2016) Nicodemos and Serra (2020); Nóvoa (2002); Schutze (1983); Saviani (2009); Tardif, Lessard and Lahaye (1991); Pineau (1985). Qualitative research makes use of dialectical hermeneutics as a strategy for investigation and understanding, through the application of a questionnaire and narrative interviews. Study participants are teachers who worked during the context of the pandemic in EJA classes, during the years 2020 and 2021, in a public school located in a peripheral neighborhood of the Federal District. The return rate of the questionnaires was 93.3%. The data obtained through the questionnaires show that EJA teachers faced some kind of challenge when teaching during the pandemic. The main challenges pointed out were: 1) the lack of preparation of EJA students for the virtual environment; 2) the students' difficulty in accessing the internet and computers; 3) the low adherence of students to remote classes; 4) teachers' difficulty in adapting to the virtual learning environment; 5) lack of structural conditions to teach remote classes; 6) the use of educational technologies. The data reveal that the pandemic greatly influenced the teaching practice in EJA, leading teachers to reinvent their practices to respond to the challenges of the teaching and learning process in the researched school. The overcoming strategies used are concentrated in four categories: 1) approaching students through active search; 2) diversification of pedagogical practice; 3) coping with the situation on their own; and 4) collective work. The study showed that the pedagogical activity during the pandemic was mainly faced by the search for knowledge through selftraining, with the learning acquired during this period being the most relevant fact in the appointment of the interviewed teachers.