ESTUDO INTERPRETATIVO DE FALAS DE PROFESSORES(AS) DE QUÍMICA SOBRE CURRÍCULO: CONCEITO, TEORIAS E FORMAÇÃO DOCENTE.

Educational studies demonstrate the complex relations between public policies, curriculum, and teachers and how it is relevant to the development of proposals to improve Brazilian education. In order to contribute to the debate on this topic, our study investigated how five Chemistry teachers express themselves in relation to the curriculum. To this end, we interviewed five educators from the state of Minas Gerais about the concept of curriculum, the social role of schools, and their motivations for teaching Chemistry. We sought to associate their responses with curriculum theories and curricular emphases for teaching science discussed in the literature. We also interviewed a Chemistry teacher trainer about the challenges of their work. Despite the limitations inherent in the data generated through interviews, we observed that, despite reporting descriptive conceptions of curriculum that were little related to social and political interests. Teachers expressed themselves more critically in relation to the social role of schools. It was possible to associate the statements with different curricular theories, such as scientific and post-critical theories. Critical theories were the least represented and are those that relate capitalist exploitation to the social inequalities that permeate schools. Curricular emphases present in the teachers' expressions regarding Chemistry teaching, it was noticed a tendency to value the perspective and experience of students. However, there was a gap in more problematizing discussions, such as those that relate Science, Technology and Society. Through our results and the statements of the teacher trainer we interviewed, we conclude that formative processes, especially in initial training, that provide opportunities for debate on the political dimension of teachers' work and the curriculum and that encourage more authentic teaching agency can be relevant contributions to the teaching of Science in Brazil. In addition, collective processes of debate and materialization of curricular policy in schools, associated with partnerships with Universities, also seem to be promising contributions to the issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]