Trajetórias de apropriação de vídeos e filmes porum grupo de professores de língua inglesa

Abstract

The TV and the video have already been seen as a threat to formal education, accused of spreading a world out of reality, of inducing students to submerge in a world of violence and ideology controlling, and of taking time that students could use studying. However, this pointof view has been replaced as quick as the means of communication and information technology stablish themselves as spaces for socialization and learning. In association with other resources and recent technological breakthoughs, audiovisual productions are present ina variety of mechanisms and environments, including schools, showing that the popularization of technology can give new directions to traditional school practices, consolidating new habits, values and kinds of interaction. In foreign language teaching, for instance, it seems a consensus that TV and video resources can offer students more authentic and meaningful experiences of learning. However, the insertion of new technological resources in teaching (or new uses for old resources) is not a simple process. It deals with several factors, amongst which are the ones related to teachers. They are, effectively, the oneswho determine wether a technology will be implemented efficiently or not. Simply demanding that teachers adopt new practices and technological artifacts in their professional activity without considering how they see the technology, what their expectations and willings are can contribute for it not to be adopted efficiently, even when motivated by political decisions, enactments and laws. This work considers teachers as a key element forchangings to happen in formal education, as well as for the adoption of technological artifacts, like the TV or video, as it investigates how the process of adoption of video and films by a group of english teachers occurs. For that, the theoretical background is based on elements ofSociocultural Theory such as Activity Theory (Engeström, Miettinen & Punamäki, 1999; Tolman, 1999; Lekstorsky, 1999; Lantolf, 2000), the Theory of Expansive Learning (Engeströn, 1999), the Theory of Perception and Action and the Theory of Affordance (Gibson, 1986; Van Lier, 1998; Albrechtsen et al, 2001; Günter, 2003). Concepts like Normalization (Bax, 2003), Multimodality (Granström, House & Karlson, 2002; Massaro, 2002; Chares & Kalterbacher, 2004), Convergency (Jenkins, 2004), and the model of technological adoption conceived by Sandhotlz, Ringstaff & Dwyer (1997) were also largely used. This study consists of an investigation of qualitative nature oriented by the principlesand procedings of action reserch. It verifies the stages/trajectories through which the english teachers of an extension course at Universidade Federal do Piauí went when participating of awork group created to discuss the benefits, problems and procedings related to the use of video and films as a didactic tool. The objectives of this research were to identify whether and how the teachers perceived video and films as a didactic-thecnological artifact, the relationship between positive/negative perceptions and actions directed to the adoption, as well as investigatin on how problem solving activities were conducted. The results show that professional and personal experiences with video and films can affect the way teachers see techology in their work environment. It also shows that rejection is related to a high level ofuncertainties concerning the applicability and efficiency of the technological artifact. However, when uncertanties are reduced, teachers become more receptible to technology and begin to adopt postures that aim at inserting it integratively in their classes.