The Inclusion of Deaf Students in Higher Education: Didactic-Pedagogical Strategies Applied to the Teaching and Learning Process

Abstract

Although the process of school inclusion in Brazil has existed for more than two decades and has been supported by documents and public policies, there are still many difficulties for students with disabilities in the process of teaching and learning. Therefore, the objective of this work was to develop and apply pedagogical strategies aimed at learning and the inclusion of deaf students in the Civil Engineering course. Fifty students without disabilities, three teachers and one student with hearing impairment participated in this study, all linked to the Civil Engineering course at a Higher Education Institution in the interior of the state of São Paulo. Participants were divided into 10 Working Groups. Data collection took place in 2017, in the discipline of Study and Research Methods and Techniques, whose students developed and applied a teaching methodology (several pedagogical strategies) to assist in the inclusion of deaf students entering higher education in the field of Civil Engineering. The stages of the study took place at three specific moments: Stage 1-the participating students conducted research on online sites on the subject of hearing impairment and, subsequently, these findings were discussed in the classroom; Stage 2 -the participants experienced awareness-raising activities addressing the theme of inclusion of people with disabilities; Stage 3 -each group was tasked with creating / elaborating four signs (Sign Language) for four specific terms / words in the Engineering area. The data were collected from Field Diaries and the use of the online platform "Google Drive" for the sharing of digital files produced by the participants. The results demonstrated the necessity and pertinence of the use of the Brazilian Sign Language in the teaching of the deaf in the subjects of the engineering courses. In addition, the participants (with and without hearing impairment) noticed an improvement in the inclusion process of students with deafness in the classroom, insofar as they could also contribute to the elaboration of a list of Signs for specific terms / words of the engineering and that were archived in the form of gifs on a digital platform on the internet.