O ensino religioso do Estado do Espírito Santo: da legislação à sala de aula em escolas estaduais da Região Metropolitana da Grande Vitória

Abstract

This dissertation focuses on the course of Religious Studies (RS) in the public schools of the state of Espírito Santo. Based on the article 33 of Law of Guidelines and Bases for National Education (Lei de Diretrizes e Bases da Educação Nacional - LDB), which indicates that each educational system is responsible for regulating course content and hiring criteria for teachers, with the support of a civil entity for the subject, this work aims to study the legal regulations in the state of Espírito Santo regarding Religious Studies, in order to understand how they are applied in practice by lecturers. For this matter, a documentary and historical analysis was done, focused on the transformation processes RS went through since the 70's until today. Five documents were analyzed, among legislation, decrees and resolutions, in addition to the Religious Studies Basic Curriculum for state public schools and interviews with people that contributed to and experienced those changes. After the examination of such documents, highlighting the emphasis of each course and teacher's education, a field study was done in four schools in the region of Grande Vitória, in order to analyze the practice of RS teachers and verify if the common curriculum and legal devices were being applied and at which extent they influenced teaching. It was detected a predominance of the teaching of moral values and the absence of the subjects proposed in the Curriculum, which focus on the various religious traditions. These flaws have been attributed to an incomplete education of teachers and the lack of pedagogical assistance. It was pointed that better communication and assistance by the superintendence to schools, offering teaching materials, courses for lecturers, seminars, i.e., pedagogical subsidies, as well as on the theory of RS, would support a better use of the legal devices and the curriculum by RS teachers.