Natural history and biology in the secondary education of Pernambuco: Morphological and stylistic features of Valdemar de Oliveira's textbooks (1939 - 1965)

Abstract

This study aimed to understand how the fields of study of natural history and biology were taught in Pernambuco between the 1930s and 1960s. A documentary research was carried out in order to examine the morphological and stylistic features found in the textbooks written by Valdemar de Oliveira, a physician and teacher from Pernambuco, taking as starting points the following categories of analysis: a) textual marks; b) techniques for organizing and condensing the text; c) implementation of content and; d) exercises. The textbooks displayed textual marks such as a significant number of scientific names and expressions in foreign languages, indicating an academic perspective of the teaching process. Instruction through repetition, using analogies or mnemonic devices, suggests that a teaching procedure was employed in order to select and establish the school content. Images were frequently used as mediating mechanisms to favor the presentation and clarification of the content. Exercises were applied as a facilitating element in the teaching process, notably the questionnaires. The suggested experimental activities were based on an inductivist perspective and constituted a didactic strategy to prove the scientific phenomenon.