The teaching professionalization path of female educators: day-care monitors in Naviraí, MS

Abstract

The collective work with children in day-cares in Brazil has been guided by the preconceived idea that a woman would be better suited to take on the responsibilities in that space because of her feminine nature.  In this context, the general purpose of this paper was to give visibility to the professionalization path of female educators from Naviraí, Mato Grosso do Sul state. Therefore, we listed four specific aims: to know when they became day care centre monitors; what reasons and/or interests led them to choose this job; how gender issues permeated and reflected on their life and career’s path; and last but not least, how they understood the need for teacher training in order to settle in their career. As methodological resource, we used the Oral History topic, as we conducted some interviews which were analyzed in the light of the eliasiano theoretical framework. We found out that the educational policies thought for the work with small children generated a change on these workers careers and these changes reflected on the teachers’ development paths. We comprehended that remembering the aspects involved both in their life and in their professional path made it possible to understand how the figurations, in other words, the interdependency network, were constituted by the women educators and, at the same time,  the women constituted themselves, bringing up gender and power issues, inherent to the different time and space of work and education.