Abstract

MACEDO, Ester Pereira Neves de. Philosophy in the National Curriculum Guidelines (Ocem) and in the National High School Exam (Enem): temporal and conceptual gaps. Educ. Pesqui. [online]. 2021, vol.47, e228013.  Epub June 23, 2021. ISSN 1678-4634.  https://doi.org/10.1590/s1678-4634202147228013.

This article analyses the correspondence between the philosophy questions administered in the Brazilian National High School Exam (Enem) and the Brazilian National Curriculum Guidelines (Ocem), published in 2006, as a case study of the relationship between curriculum document and large scale assessment, having as theoretical framework what Stephen Ball and Richard Bow call “policy cycle” (BALL; BOWE, 1992; BOWE, BALL; GOLD, 1992; MAINARDES, 2006). This study becomes particularly relevant given, on the one hand, the intermittence of the offering of philosophy in Brazilian high schools, and, on the other, the imminent reformulation of the exam, to conform to the new National Common Core (BNCC). This study highlights Ball and Bowe´s thesis that the “implementation” of curricular documents is neither automatic nor certain. By analyzing the Ocem as part of a web of educational policies for high school, of which the Enem and the BNCC are also part, the present study aims to contribute towards strengthening the place of philosophy in high school, by highlighting points of continuity and points of tension between the preexisting nodes of this web. This article is divided in three parts: 1) a quantitative overview of how the philosophy contents proposed by the Ocem were covered in the exam in the last twenty years, pointing out gaps that still persist; 2) exploration of some factors that explain these gaps, in particular the difference in origin and purpose of each of these instruments; 3) qualitative analysis of how the conceptual differences between the Ocem and the Enem translate in how philosophy appears in the exam throughout the years. In conclusion, I present some points of reflection about the prospect for philosophy on the exam in this new horizon after the publication of the new BNCC.

Keywords : High school philosophy; Large scale assessment; National curriculum.

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