PERFORMANCE OF GEOGRAPHY TEACHERS IN THE DISCURSIVE TEST OF THE PUBLIC COMPETITION FOR TEACHERS OF BASIC EDUCATION IN THE STATE OF PERNAMBUCO

Abstract

Teacher education still faces challenges related to students' fundamental skills. A notable example is the lack of writing skills on the part of future teachers, although this is an essential competence for the profession. In this context, we sought to evaluate the performance of the textual production of graduates of the Geography course compared to other degree courses, using the grades obtained in the Essay Test (writing) of the Public Competition for the position of Basic Education Teacher in the State of Pernambuco, held in 2022. The methodological path included the tabulation of the discursive notes by area of knowledge. Statistical measures of central tendency and dispersion were calculated. Subsequently, the scores were submitted to the Kolmogorov-Smirnov normality test, to verify the hypothesis of normality of the data. Finally, the scores of the essay test of the Geography candidates were compared with the scores obtained by candidates from other courses through the Mann-Whitney test. The following degree courses participated in the event: Arts, Geography, Biology, Physical Education, Philosophy, Chemistry, Mathematics, Sociology, History, Portuguese, English, Spanish and Physics. The means and medians of all courses showed similarity, with average scores between 18.5 and 21.4 points, and medians ranging between 19.9 and 22.7, out of a total of 30 possible points. The Physical Education course had the lowest average (18.5) of the scores of the discursive test, with the highest frequency of interval of the scores between 10 and 20 points. Candidates in the Sociology course obtained the highest average of grades (21.4), with attendance concentrated in the range of 25 to 30 points. The Geography course had an average score of 20.8, a median of 21.4, and the frequency of essay scores was in the range of 20 to 30 points. Regarding the dispersion measures, it was observed that most of the courses presented a coefficient of variation below 30%, with the exception of the Physical Education and Mathematics courses, showing that the candidates of these courses presented very different grades. In contrast, candidates in the Geography course had similar performance scores. The result of the Mann-Whitney test confirmed that there was no significant difference between the grades of the Geography course and the grades of the other courses. These results highlight the need to seek strategies, such as the implementation of reading groups, writing workshops, among other actions, that strengthen textual production in teaching degrees.