Teaching Afro-Brazilian history should be in all subjects

Experts provide guidance on how to take it into classrooms and show that implementation goes beyond formal content and sometimes involves just promoting dialogue between students themselves and approaches from teachers that consider different realities. .

Professor and writer Sheila Perina de Souza is studying a delicate stage of teaching, literacy, during her doctorate at the Faculty of Education at the University of São Paulo (USP). She researches the teaching of Portuguese influenced by some African languages. In addition to contributing to vocabulary, such as the word moleque, which comes from Kimbundu, a language spoken in Angola, they have another type of influence.

“When they use the plural, children, especially those from the lower class, often mark the plural once, then say: ‘Get the books’. They do not mark the plural ‘Get the books’. This is the influence of languages ​​of Bantu origin, which have the plural marking at the beginning and not the plural”,

explains.

The way the school deals with situations like this makes all the difference in the education of children. Whether they just deal with a mistake, criticizing the child, or whether they have a welcoming attitude. “I try to observe how linguistic racism, which is often confused with linguistic prejudice, is dealt with in literacy, during this period of schooling which is of fundamental importance for the relationship that the child will establish with knowledge”, explains Souza.

It is issues like this that schools need to deal with on a daily basis and which 10.639/03 and the guidelines for applying it address. Each teaching stage has peculiarities that need to be taken into consideration and also issues that schools must be aware of.

child education

In early childhood education, a stage that includes daycare and pre-school, according to Souza, literature has been a fundamental gateway to the implementation of law 10.639/03. In addition to books, it is possible to work on arts, music and also dance.

“Musical language is fundamental when we look at what we offer our children on a daily basis, what songs we present. We present music from different peoples, we manage to bring music from different ethnicities and go deeper.”

According to the teacher, when presenting a song, one can not only say that it is from Africa, but explain that it is from a certain country, from a certain region.

“Our origin is marked by power relations that are built through race as well. So, we have to look at songs that are traditionally songs from childhood culture and question whether these songs are in dialogue with the curriculum, with what we want to build, because we have a repertoire of music that children have learned have racist content”, he highlights. the teacher.

The deputy executive coordinator of Ação Educativa, Edneia Gonçalves, adds that in addition to providing materials and games, teachers need to be attentive to interactions between children. “Take care to see how children approach each other. At circle time [se alguém diz algo como]: ‘I’m not going to hold her hand because it’s black’. This is super common. What kind of message is it bringing, what kind of education is it bringing. When you don’t bring up the history of that child’s ancestors and don’t give new meaning to the black presence in Brazilian history, you do the same thing, you reject not only the body but also the child’s ancestral language,” he says.

At this stage, according to Edneia Gonçalves, it is also necessary to be aware of the references that are presented to children, the characters that are presented, and ensure that they also resemble the children themselves and their families. Also check how black characters appear in children’s stories and what types of heroes are presented.

Elementary School

Elementary education ranges from the 1st to the 9th year, a period in which children learn to read and also a period in which they have another teacher and begin to transition to secondary school, leaving childhood and entering adolescence.

Also at this stage, according to Edneia Gonçalves, it is necessary to look at the texts that are presented and, if they contain racist content, this must be pointed out, contextualized and discussed.

Law enforcement goes beyond the humanities and must be considered in exact sciences.

“Africa has a set of games to work on mathematics. First, it requires broader research, because our education is Eurocentric. Let’s look for African characters, references and matrices to bring, let’s think about Africa before colonization. This in elementary school is essential. Teach Africa before colonization and think after the period of colonization. This requires research, maps, new texts and new sources”,

explains.

In the field of language, Gonçalves says that we can consider communication and language systems that precede the orthographic system we use. “Always with the aim of expanding knowledge. [O conteúdo] have to cross [várias disciplinas] and when it crosses, it requires that teachers also prepare themselves and that networks train educators”, he says.

High school

Secondary education is the last stage of basic education. It is also the stage with the highest dropout rates. “High school has a huge challenge, which is the challenge of black youth, their cultures, how we are working on black youth culture.” The coordinator explains that it is very important that teachers also listen to students, a teaching that comes from the educator and philosopher Paulo Freire and popular education.

“The students know. Our work is to bring out the knowledge that this student has so that this knowledge can be articulated with our knowledge to produce transformations in both the student’s and the teacher’s learning. Knowing what this student knows gives us access to the territories that this student covers and this will have applications for all areas of knowledge”, says Edneia Gonçalves.

She adds: “a slam battle [batalha de poesia falada], for example, you listen and think where did this young person acquire all this repertoire if school isn’t teaching this? This means that there is an environment for the circulation of culture and knowledge that the school must also access”.

At this stage, the coordinator emphasizes that it is also important that anti-racist education be carried out, which redesigns the narrative of Brazilian history, bringing the perspective of the resistance of the black population. In this sense, it is important to know and take the stories outlined by social movements into classrooms.

“Always, at any of the school stages, you assume that it is the social function of the school to articulate the knowledge systematized by science with the knowledge of different cultures so that we produce meaningful learning for all people”, summarizes Gonçalves.

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