Educação e construção do conhecimento: do universo individual à inteligência coletiva

Abstract

The purpose of this research was to investigate if the communication and interactivity provided by a groupware, on a contextualized and problematized situation, may constitute a way to promote the construction of knowledge. The research involved students at the disciplines of Administrative Thinkink History, Financial Management I e Financial Management II, from the Business School of a private University at São Paulo State, using internet as pedagogical supporting tool to complement presencial studies. The methodology proposed was a case study focused on a scholar learning context. The data was collected combining participant observation and students personal testimonials using a non-structured interview. The analysis appealed to a text deconstruction of the interview corpus, fragmented on sense unitys that contained useful meanings to the research purpose, classified on four categories. The categories Time and virtual environment; Communication and Context represented partial arguments to validate the category Construction of Knowledge, which is the thesis, and therefore, the purpose of the search. The results provided an evidence that virtual environment has extended time and space for live environment classes, increasing communication and the possibility of exchanging information and ideas on interpersonal relationship basis. The groupware provided a way to gather people on the construction of knowledge; allows interactivity among cognitive persons that may, together, conceive and transform a known world; facilitate information exchange on conversation nets. The category Context analysis showed that reflection over arguments that comes from different points of view becomes richer when it is contextualized on a located and chronologysed situation. On the construction of knowledge, we presented that it occurs by debate and conversation about reality and its context, demanding comprehension and understanding of individual points of view on a collective and dynamic situation. The groupware is a conversation tool, an appropriated environment for an educational process anchored on communication, context and information.