Supervision, knowledge and improvement - a transformative triangulation in schools?

• Autor(a) principal: Roldão, Maria do Céu
• Data de Publicação: 2012
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: https://doi.org/10.34632/investigacaoeducacional.2012.3373

The concept of supervision has become a controversial issue within education, as far as it has been looked at from a variety of theoretical views and diverse praxiological perspectives that may imply to interpret it, either in terms of any professional activity, or specifically in teaching, having in mind different meanings and purposes. The analysis presented in this article is built upon the assumption that the professional action of teaching implies a specific and differentiated kind of knowledge (Roldão 2007, Montero, 2005) which is expected to sustain the legitimacy and the quality of performance. It aims at discussing and establishing the role that supervison may play as a tool for improving the quality of individual teaching. Different theoretical analysis (Mosher e Purpel, 1972; Alarcão e Tavares, 2003; Alarcão e Roldão, 2008; Vieira, 2006) will be examined in order to clarify the multi-significance of the concept itself and its implications for practical use in schools; it also aims at illuminating some singularities of the relation of educational systems and teachers‘ culture, particularly in Portugal, with specific meanings and practices that have been historically associated with supervision. Another dimension of the present analysis is focused on the resistance towards supervision as a regular tool within daily life of schools, analyzing the potentialities that transforming such reluctance into a positive attitude would convey to the actual improvement of teaching and learning in schools.