O lugar da velhice na escola: atitudes de crianças em relação à velhice

Abstract

The changes that occurred in the demographic distribution in the Brazilian population have caused numerous changes in the functioning of society as a whole, as well as in the way society deals with the elderly. Thus, this research had as a general objective to analyze attitudes regarding the old age of elementary school children initial years and as specific objectives: a) identify concepts of aging, as well as conceptions and representations of old age throughout history and in today's society; b) to question about the school, its social function and the teacher and student as subjects of the same; c) verify approximations and distances between documents that govern the curricular content physical education in elementary school years and the thematic old age. The research took as reference authors such as Beauvoir (1970), Freitas and Py (2016), Neri (2007), (2013), Papalia, Olds and Feldman (2010), among others, to address the issues related to aging, Freire (2000), (2002), Saviani (1999), Manacorda (1997), among others, to address issues related to education, Bracht (1999), Darido (2012), Soares (1994), among others. (1988), Todaro (2008), Luchesi (2011), Newman, Faux and Larimer (1997), Neri (1991), among others, to deal with issues related to children's attitudes. This research is characterized, as far as the approach, as a qualitative research, and is classified as an exploratory descriptive research. As a collection instrument, a questionnaire composed of one part with sociodemographic data and the other by the Scale Todaro (composed of four domains, namely, agency, social relationship, persona and cognition) was chosen, which was subsequently analyzed from the content analysis, according to Bardin (2010) and Souza Júnior, Melo and Santiago (2010). In this way, it was possible to verify a positive attitude of the children in relation to old age, which is in agreement with the findings of previous researches at national and international level. This finding, however, did not extinguish the existence of specific points in which the attitudes were more negative, as can be verified in the domain cognition, presenting a score of almost 0.2 points above the general. This research concluded that, despite finding more positive attitudes, it is necessary a directed educational action that addresses the old age theme within the school, therefore, it is believed that it is possible to provide a change in stereotypes linked to the elderly and to form a generation that deals with old age differently from past generations.