TEACHERS WORKING HOURS IN EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION

Abstract

Regular teachers have the right to one third of their working hours as working time, which is enshrined in Law No. 9.394/96, and later in Law No. 11.738/2008. In order to guarantee the legislation, the federal, state and municipal governments had to organize themselves. In Early Childhood Education, it was necessary to hire hourly teachers to work with the children during the period when the teachers are doing their planning, studies and training. Given this scenario, the central question of this research arises: What are the characteristics of hourly teachers in Early Childhood Education and who are they? In order to answer this question, the general objective is to characterize who these workers are and what their role is when teachers are taking advantage of their working hours. Based on the theoretical framework of Historical-Dialectical Materialism and Historical-Cultural Theory, bibliographical and field research was used to uncover this object of study. The results show that the participants in the research are professionals belonging to the teaching staff, with the function of carrying out the pedagogical work in the classroom during the teachers' working hours. Thus, the pedagogical mediation of hourly teachers is developed through thematic projects, taking into account the specific nature of each class with dynamic activities. There is a need to separate the work of the hourly teachers from that of the regular teachers. In addition, the institutional organization for guaranteeing working hours for teachers needs to be rethought in order to ensure that children develop fully.