Teachers and their role in the formation of citizens: Discrepancies between understandings, practices and expectations

Abstract

This study, using semi-structured interviews and ethnographic records of classes, collects the analysis of nine teachers from three different regions of Chile who are in charge of the subject denominated History, Geography, and Social Sciences in middle schools. The goal was to understand how they conceive the formation of citizens from their professional performance and how they work with it in their classrooms. Results show that there is a great diversity in the type of training received and the ideas that teachers have about how to form citizens in the school; however, this trend is not replied in same way in their classroom practice where the strategies applied are much more homogeneous. In addition, when teachers plan their lessons, they rely more on their experience as citizens rather than on the academic training received at university.