The modular structure of the professional courses in public secondary schools: from the curricular model to the practical classes. A collaborative investigation

• Autor(a) principal: Orvalho, Luísa
• Data de Publicação: 2011
• Outros Autores: Alonso, Luísa
• 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.2011.3332

The curriculum innovation refers to the processes of curriculum design as to its development. This article presents a summary of research within the PhD in Education, the dissertation entitled “The modular structure of vocational courses in public secondary schools: the current curriculum practices. Two case studies” is a qualitative research case study based on a methodological approach to collaborative action research (C-A-R), carried out in two public secondary schools. This study aims to identify the critical success factors arisen from the pushed on generalization of school vocational courses, created by the Reform of Secondary Education (approved by the Decree-Law No. 74/2004 of March 26th, with the corrections brought by the Declaration of Rectification No. 44/2004 of May 25th), as well as, to determine the plans of intervention, restructuring and improvement in the application of the modular curriculum structure needed to be led in, so that the organizational, teaching and assessment practices can be developed consistently with the theoretical model advocated and implemented in vocational schools. Furthermore, the aim is to deepen the perceptions, the knowledge of the teaching practices and the teaching and assessment strategies used by the teachers in vocational courses in order to implement the Modular Structure (MS) in public secondary schools, whereas “the commitment in a modular structure represents one of the key elements of the training project in the Vocational Schools” (Azevedo, J., 1991). Thus, in order that the training practices can be developed coherently with the curriculum model which grounds the MS, so as to foster the innovation desired, it is considered that the analysis model adopted in this research can be a strategic tool to give new meanings to school and to professional teaching in the vocational education. The analytical model adopted – integrated model of innovation to manage the change in the public school curriculum with vocational courses – is based on four foundations: modular curriculum development, teacher professional development, organizational development and development of teaching and learning processes. It is considered that with this research the original objectives were largely achieved and thus was given a significant contribution in the area of knowledge – vocational education. This conviction has been strengthened throughout the fieldwork in both cases, the data collected, analyzed, interpreted and compared, which cannot be generalized, open a wider window in order to observe how MS is being appropriate by teachers and implemented in ESP and thus open up opportunities to build new proposals for improvement.