Educação alimentar e nutricional: proposta pedagógica para o ensino infantil e fundamental com base na pedagogia histórico-crítica

Abstract

By taking care of the preparation and distribution of food in the school environment, the nutritionist can see oneself as an educator. However, applying the food and nutritional Education methodology (EAN) is a complex task to the nutrition professional, who faces hardship to connect the biological knowledge to the social dimension of education. Health promotion actions imposes the approach of individuals to the reality by combining technical and popular knowledge. The promotion of scientific technical knowledge about food and nutrition amongst school teachers aims to improve the school as a place of health promotion; however, teachers must have knowledge and skills on this topic, and should seek to incorporate it to his teaching, ensuring sustainability of one the actions inside and outside of the classroom. As a transformation agent, the nutritionist can advance in his performance by breaking the traditional technical fragmentation and promoting integrality and social participation. This study brings a pedagogical proposal of EAN, based on historical-critical pedagogy, for students in preschool and elementary school. This proposal was elaborated starting from an analysis of the Pedagogic Political Project, the Annual Educational Planning, and from the school’s 2015 courseware. The school mentioned is a non-profit private school. The elaboration of pedagogical proposal was based on historical-critical pedagogy, considering the five steps of the method proposed and guided by the practice of work projects. The proposed themes had, as a substantiation, the concepts of Behavioural Nutrition, the principles and recommendations of the Marco de Referência em Educação Alimentar e Nutricional para Políticas Públicas, and the principles and recommendations of the Guia Alimentar para a População Brasileira. The results demonstrate that the institution offers some possibilities for the development of the proposal of this work, despite being a school whose pedagogical practices reflect a traditional didactics. Themes involving EAN are present in the planning and in the material of all grades, guaranteeing the permanent character of this approach. The community and the family are not relevantly involved in the actions, but it is possible to highlight the culinary appreciation as an emancipatory practice, as well as the great potential that the classes of Agriculture represents towards to the actions of EAN. The purpose of this study considers the possibility that the educational activities could be started in any one of the mentioned cores. In addition, the study aimed to give meaning to the actions, by inducing the families of the students, in order to them to participate and contribute to consolidate the learning. Taking into account all of the aspects involved in this new proposal of EAN, does not mean one will be able to focus on all of them. The awareness that the capitalist society is not the ideal ground to establish a historical-critical pedagogy, do not preclude the actions. Although it seems like an uphill task, it would not be recommended to stall the start of the job, even if the beginning consists by only changing the way teachers and the students think; the important is to offer the possibility to understand the social and education changes that are necessary for the development of autonomy for adequate and sustainable food choices.