Oportunidades de autorregulação em contexto pré-escolar: percepções e práticas de educadores de infância

Abstract

ResumoConhecendo as competências das crianças para autorregular as tarefas cotidianas e seguindo uma perspetiva sociocognitiva, procuramos compreender as percepções de educadores de infância sobre a promoção da autorregulação de tarefas. Pretendíamos também conhecer as práticas educativas que promovem oportunidades para as crianças autorregularem tarefas na educação pré-escolar. Realizamos um estudo de casos múltiplos com quatro contextos ao longo de seis meses, entrevistando as educadoras e observando as práticas com os seus grupos de crianças. Nas entrevistas, o aspecto mais destacado pelas educadoras refere que é preciso respeitar o desenvolvimento individual, sendo também necessário potenciá-lo. Nas observações sistemáticas, identificamos 739 indicadores de autorregulação que avaliamos em quatro dimensões: controle emocional e comportamental, controle cognitivo, atitudes prossociais e motivação para a autorregulação. Os resultados permitiram relacionar as dimensões de autorregulação com o discurso das educadoras e as oportunidades observadas nos contextos. As oportunidades que remetiam para o controle emocional e comportamental e o controle cognitivo foram as mais expressivas, no geral, e as de motivação para a autorregulação estiveram em maior número, mas só num contexto. A investigação permite refletir sobre a intencionalidade pedagógica num ambiente onde (quase) tudo é brincar, mas também sublinha a pertinência de desenvolver a autonomia das crianças na educação pré-escolar em graus de liberdade cada vez maiores. Nas implicações do estudo, refere-se que é preciso apoiar os educadores nas suas práticas para que criem oportunidades nos contextos que permitam às crianças deter o papel ativo na construção do conhecimento. Palavras-chaveAutorregulação -Educação pré-escolar -Estratégias pedagógicas -Educadores de infância. AbstractFollowing a socio-cognitive perspective, preschool children have competencies to selfregulate daily tasks. Considering this, we questioned preschool teachers' perceptions about the promotion of self-regulation in this context. We also observed educational practices, given children where were opportunities to self-regulate preschool tasks. This was a multiple case study with four schools. We interviewed teachers and observed practices along six months. In the interviews, the most quoted issue was the need to respect children's individual development, and also the importance of promoting it. In systematic observations, we identified 739 self-regulation indicators categorized in four dimensions: emotional and behavioral control, cognitive control, pro-social attitudes, as well as motivation to self-regulation. The results linked self-regulation dimensions to teachers' speech and the opportunities children were provided with. The most expressive dimensions were emotional and behavioral control and cognitive control. The motivation to self-regulation dimension was the most emphasized, but only at one school. The discussion reflects how preschool play should have a pedagogical intentionality...

Dynamic assessment of self-regulated learning in preschool

“…or deciding where to draw the geometrical figures in the paper. Those examples may lead to a deeper reflection on how preschool children can regulate their learning process ( Bryce and Whitebread, 2012 ; Silva Moreira and Veiga Simão, 2019 ). Moreover, the questioning approach applied in this study seems to be feasible to replicate in daily educational practices, promoting experiences where children are actively engaged in the learning process.…”

“…However, they solved the task in an autonomous way without any verbal support of the facilitator. Previous research had already documented that, in the SRL field, the monitoring, volition, and motivational control processes are less present in educational practices than the planning and reflection phases ( Silva Moreira and Veiga Simão, 2019 ).…”

“…Moreover, the IRT results presented good properties about the tasks applied in our investigation (i.e., Clown task and HTKS task), reinforcing the relevance of using everyday material that is available in any common social context of learning in assessment periods. Also, meeting daily preschool practices, the interactive dynamic between the facilitator and the child stimulated with the DASP method proved to be a very common exercise ( Silva Moreira and Veiga Simão, 2019 ), and therefore, we consider that the method interview format can provide great flexibility and authenticity to preschool assessment approaches.…”

“…Upcoming research could allow children to observe their performance, benefiting from the potentialities of a stimulated recall technique, rarely used with preschoolers (e.g., Morales and Rumenapp, 2017 ). We suggest including the DASP method in preschool teachers' special training and professional development, so they can practice SRL assessment and promotion in preschool daily practices ( Silva Moreira and Veiga Simão, 2019 ). Lastly, even though this instrument may contribute to some advance in the research field, more instruments with close objectives to the DASP method should be designed to better meet the actual needs in the preschool context.…”