Entre expectativas docente e possibilidades: deslocamentos na formação do leitor literário no Peja

Abstract

During the Professional Master’s Program in Literature/Profletras, I identified the absence of courses related both to the theoretical repertoire and to the didactics of literature in my initial teacher education. I came to understand that reading literary works is the right of every citizen. Reflecting on my teaching practice in the Youth and Adult Education Program (PEJA) , I recognized the need for a plan aimed at fostering readers through the construction of a reading itinerary committed to the development and establishment of a literary culture within the school, for this audience acknowledged as “unlikely readers” (Marques, 2018) .In this process, I became aware that an appropriate theoretical repertoire to support reading practices, a specialist teacher conscious of their ethical and political role, the selection of genuinely literary texts, dedicated reading time in the school environment, and both personal and public collections are some of the essential elements for forming a reader. This research aims to contribute to the formation of critical and autonomous readers in the PEJA of a municipal school in Rio de Janeiro, in the evening shift, located in the neighborhood of Manguinhos, through the construction of a reading itinerary organized around the planning of an intentional path — progressive in difficulty and heterogeneous in terms of genres, narrative structures, language, narrative voices, and themes (Colomer, 2007) . For the textual study, I highlighted diverse literary contents selected from the possibilities offered by the itinerary’s corpus, to broaden and diversify the theoretical and metalinguistic repertoire, both essential to forming readers attentive to textual craftsmanship and the construction of meaning. In this process, the complete reading of Stefano, a work by María Teresa Andruetto (2014), winner of the 2012 Hans Christian Andersen Award, stands out. I also reflect on issues related to the approach to teaching literature at school, analyzing the selection of works that composed this reading path. Throughout the journey of the itinerary, the methodological approach included mediation practices such as reading texts aloud, attentive listening during reading activities, literary conversations as teaching situations, and the production of reading diaries by students, to record in writing the phenomena involved in the reception of literary mediation. I recorded observations regarding these practices in a field diary, with the aim of examining the process that unfolded between the planned itinerary, the path taken, and the analyses of readers’ progress. The research was characterized as action research, reflecting on and theorizing about the pedagogical practice itself. Throughout the readings of the itinerary, several ways of reading literary texts were taught, and it was possible to observe that the students climbed many steps on the ladder of reading (Colomer, 2007). Accompanying me on this journey are the theoretical reflections of Andruetto (2012), Bajour (2012), Candido (2012), Castrillón (2011), Colomer (2007), Lerner (2002), Montes (2020), Petit (2009), and Souza (2018).