“School is not the principle of transforming things. It is part of a complex network of institutions and cultural practices. It is not worth more or less than the society in which it is inserted. The condition for its change does not lie in an appeal to the grandeur of its mission, but rather in the creation of conditions that allow daily work, professionally qualified and supported from the point of view Social. The metaphor of the continent (the great education systems) does not suit the 21st century school. It is in the image of the archipelago (the connection between small islands) that we can best identify the effort that needs to be made” (António Nóvoa)
Respecting the specificities of the family and the school, these institutions can indeed establish productive partnerships in favor of school success. This is what a group of teachers who participated in a mini-course last week expressed. The event was promoted by the Department of Education and Culture of Tocantins and addressed the relationship between family and school, its limits and possibilities. The attempt was to understand the limits of each one in the schooling processes and what the possibilities of institutionally shared work can be. In theory, the family and the school have very specific social roles; however, not antagonistic. They can even, in many circumstances, be complementary: if the family is responsible
The important thing is to be clear that the teacher is a professional of systematized knowledge, and not the extension of the family group, which is why he is not the “uncle”, just as the family group educates for affection and personal formation, and not the person whom the school holds responsible for the failures of the schooling. It is to this perspective that Ana Lúcia (student, like the others mentioned in this article) calls our attention: “The family and the school, walking hand in hand, generate academic success”. This idea is shared by Duvanez Alves de Oliveira, for whom “The participation of the family in the child's teaching-learning process is the strength that education has to work”. And, as Eunice Rodrigues tells us, “When the school and the family truly assume their role, the efforts of Brazilian school education will certainly reveal better results”. Yes, a complement, as long as there is social justice and equitable sharing of social, cultural, epistemic and natural goods.
If, as Francismário Queiroz says, “The family is a fundamental source for the development of human beings and society”, the school is also decisive to the human formation of future citizens and professionals, which is why both must offer their own for the benefit of this development and training, not least because, as stated by Geny Martins de Sousa, “The spirit of reciprocity is very important for all human beings; therefore, my life only makes sense if we share it with other lives”. Why couldn't that be true for family members and school members? Yes, reciprocity in specificity, knowing that, structurally, society also has to develop a project for a transforming nation!
This seems to be the motto of all possible work between parents and teachers, family and educational institution, through partnerships productive for all and amidst the same proposals for the constitution of humanizing social models and existential styles humanizers. In this context, “When the school and the family discover themselves as partners in construction and transformation”, assures Ilzany da Rocha Oliveira “teaching will have a new face”. I hope so!
A new face that means lightness and rapture, in activities that, instead of being heavy and dull, provoking small wars between parents and teachers, can be light and smooth, as Leonice Ferreira, from the Junior Pioneers Program, says, “When there is something that interests us, time passes quickly!". And it does! Complicated is when there is no real understanding of what is up to each one and many teachers think that filling the school with parents will solve the teaching problems. Or when families think that their child's schooling is an activity they shouldn't care about. No, if the family and the school “form a fundamental link for the human being”, as Maria Cardoso Rodrigues says, the important thing is to use the lightness of spontaneity to reinforce this link in common activities, even if different in their conception, nature and realization; even though they demand, in some circumstances, blood and sweat for both. This really isn't easy; it demands dedication and political-ideological will to see reality as it is, digging for its roots, judging by pursuing the best to do and acting to mark and make history. Along these lines, it is good to remember that “It is only in the sum of our efforts that we will have interesting solutions and results for our actions”, as Maria Ferreira warns.
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Efforts seem to be the key word to understand that both the family and the school are at turns to a societal model and an existential style that they have to deal with while educating or school. As a school and family, they are social institutions that lend themselves to contribute to the historical development of the natural and of our communities, it is crucial to understand which mode of material production of life interferes with the work of a other; what kind of political regime do we maintain to deal with issues relating to power; and what forms of cultural, ideological and epistemic expressions we nurture as valid and worthy of the occupation of the family and school. This is important because all these factors cut across the family and the school, and it does not seem sensible to me to ask them to do what the economy, politics, the culture and epistemology, but, contrary to this, that they act in a way to clarify ideological issues that put pressure on both social institutions in their attributions everyday.
It is not up to the school and the family to perpetrate social justice, conscious political participation and fair distribution of symbolic-cultural goods, including the epistemic, where the economy is not fair, where politics is not anchored in the sovereignty of the people and where symbolic culture and diverse knowledge human beings are not concretely produced, made available and appropriated according to the equinanimous criteria of equality in differences and freedom responsible. From this perspective, we can share the understanding of Sofia Sena, for whom “the knowledge about the challenges and possibilities of the school for social change” becomes “the starting point for overcoming inequality existing” among us.
Maintaining these specificities, and knowing that the family is not a school and that a school is not a family, considering the tasks of caring and teaching, a A serious challenge is remembered as one of the attributions of the school institution: “The school must enable family members to experience reflections that give them conditions to rebuild their self-esteem so that they don't feel rejected but welcomed by the school institution”, provokes us Vilma Sônia de Oak. In an exclusionary society, the limitations of institutional inclusions can even help, even if they do not make social structures more favorable to human development. Even so, I hope that the school's initiatives to work together with the family are a possible way to improve our school productivity. This the teachers, educated in the art of educating, know well how to do it. They don't need recipes; they do need social support, encouragement and understanding.
Socially referenced, as Nóvoa reminds us, the “teaching school island” can, and even should, be associated with the “school island caring family" so that, together, they develop their small missions, always articulated with the big issues social. That, perhaps, is followed by initiatives that can improve social structures so that they provide conditions of possibility for the healthy development of people and balanced human fulfillment.
Per Wilson Correia
Columnist Brazil School
Brazil School - education