Analysis of speeches of future Biology teachers on Environmental Education: meanings produced in the context of an evaluation

Abstract

This paper lies in the field of teacher training of Biological Sciences and it is devoted to discussing topics related to the presence of Environmental Education (EE) in undergraduate courses. The objective of the study is to interpret the speeches of future teachers on EE from the analysis of texts authored by them in the context of an evaluation of the compulsory subject "Teaching Laboratory I" of a  degree course in Biology at a public university in Brazil. Therefore, the Discourse Analysis is used as the theoretical and methodological framework of the research in order to understand the contexts of production and constitution of the speeches of the research subjects. The results point to the existence of speeches relayed to a traditional conception of EE highlighting the size of the transmission of information and ecological knowledge especially aimed at changing individual behaviors from your awareness. On the other hand, there is a predominance of a hybrid discourse on EE in which students enter aspects conservationists, facing a view of problem solving, but also reflect on the economic and political structure of the consumer society, which would be more turned to a critical approach to environmental education.