Educação inclusiva e Pedagogia Waldorf: o ser humano no epicentro da arte educativa

Abstract

Studies on inclusive education in Brazil began in the 1990s. Since then some changes have been made to Brazilian legislation to guarantee access and permanence for all students in mainstream education, regardless of their specific educational needs. However, because it is a new paradigm, dissent around the concept and the spread of multiple understandings still make it difficult to understand it and the consequent inclusive educational practice in schools. Considering the existing problem, this study aims to analyze how the essential elements of the inclusive education paradigm, relating to teaching, learning, and assessment processes, are worked on in a Waldorf school, whose educational principles are formulated by Waldorf Education, which is based on Anthroposophy. This is a qualitative and exploratory study, constituting a case study. Content Analysis was used to analyze the data collected through direct observation and semi-structured interviews with teachers at a Waldorf school. Based on the construction and analysis of the research corpus, two categories of analysis were identified: (i) Rudolf Steiner's philosophy of education as a foundation for teaching, learning, and assessment processes: awareness of individuality and the physical, psychic and spiritual development of the human being, which highlighted the interviewed teachers' beliefs about teaching, learning and assessment; and (ii) educational practice based on observation and bonding, which made it possible to understand that educational processes are carried out from the establishment of a bond between teacher and student and that meeting students' educational needs is carried out through teacher observation, considering the uniqueness of each student. It was concluded that there are significant convergences between the Waldorf educational practice of the context analyzed and the theory of inclusive education about teaching, learning, and assessment processes, despite the different perspectives on the constitution of being. For both Waldorf Education, and inclusive education, the human being is a unique and unrepeatable phenomenon in its essence and expression. It needs to be considered in this way in the educational process.