Integration Between Face-to-Face and Virtual Training in the Continuing Education of Educators: Limits, Challenges and Potentials

Abstract

This study aims to analyze the perception of Basic Education educators into a course entitled “Continued Education of in-service Educators: the STS Approach as an Articulator of the Integrated Curriculum” in the area of Science Technology Society (STS), as well as the limits and potential of continuing education. The extension course at the Federal University of Santa Maria lasted 80 hours and was held during the 2016 school year, with face-to-face meetings at the participating school and activities in the Virtual Teaching and Learning Environment - Moodle. We aimed to apply and discuss Information and Communication Technologies, continuing education, and the curriculum and evaluate the process. Low adherence of educators to the distance stage of the course was identified, compared to the face-to-face stage, generating questions about the need for training processes focused on technologies and within the teachers’ workload. Data were collected based on observation, participation, and performance of activities and through a questionnaire in which educators evaluated the course. Data analysis was based on tabulation in Excel spreadsheets, notes, speeches, and involvement of the participants. The closed questions were analyzed using graphs and the open ones by analyzing the Collective Subject Discourse, a technique used by Lefevre, Lefevre, and Teixeira (2003). A low adherence of educators to the distance learning phase of the course was identified, compared to the face-to-face phase, which raised questions about the need for training processes focused on technologies, but within the teachers’ workload.