WARNING: These notes are the filtered understanding of a non-expert. Take them with a grain of salt.
The public schools are almost entirely poor children. The wealthy can afford to send their kids to private schools and the middle class tries very hard to put together the money to do the same. The wealthy often send their kids to French or English schools.
Brazil is a somewhat wealthy country, but there is a very broad distribution of wealth. A very small number of elite hold most of the money.
Not all public schools are bad, but there's a range in quality of education. Some public schools are relatively good. It used to be that some education systems were organized at the state level, which meant municipalities without strong leadership could still get access to good education. But since a few years ago, all education is organized at the municipal level (municipalities being town centers with rural areas, or towship, or city surrounding). That means that there can be much variation within the same state. Mayors (elected every 4 years) have a lot of power over education. Mayors with a focus on social issues might give more resources for education.
The poorest municipalities still have some federal support.
The Northeast is the poorest part of the country. She felt like it would be a likely focus for deployment if the goal is to get to poor children. There is some variation here in wealth because there are wealthier people near the coast, but inland it is poorer, I think. They are putting some money into social issues/education/infrastructure.
In the North is the Amazon. It's poor in a different way. There are less resources for education, and less infrastructure, but there is good nutrition and such.
The Southeast is the richest part of the country. There are better schools. People elect mayors/governors who invest in education and health.
The Center-west is somewhat rich because of farming and grain production, but it still varies.
There is much variation between urban and rural areas.
She has some experience with kids in rural areas:
In urban areas it's somewhat different:
She emphasized that generally, people in Brazil are very open to new things. Culturally, they are open to new technology, and new behaviors. In other parts of the world, where things are more tribal, people might hang onto traditional ways of living, but she said that is less the case in Brazil.
There are 8 years of mandatory elementary school, followed by 3 years of high school.
Kids sometimes get held back.
Sometimes kids have to miss classes to help with harvesting.
There is a government incentive program called "Bolsa Familia" that gives parents about $7/mo for sending their kids to school.
Class lasts for about 4hr/day, from about 7:30am until noon.
After school, kids might:
It seems like kids in rural areas are more likely to go home after school and be with their parents.
There's a bit of a gender difference in contributing to the household. Girls start helping earlier, doing:
Some municipalities (and some NGOs, churches, etc) have after school programs. Here, kids would get lunch, have time to do their homework, and then have supervised play while their parents are working. This is more common in urban areas.
Kids also do a lot of playing. They play soccer, they fly kites. They spend lots of time with other kids. Even while working, often there are other kids around and some level of playing. They play a lot.
The social life is more family oriented. People go to parties with the whole family, not like here where there are often separate parties for each age range.
The family is an important social network and important for economic survival. It provides lots of support in the form of childcare, etc.
There is almost no foreign language education in the poorer schools. In the middle/upper classes kids will learn english, and there is foreign language in the curriculum in 5th grade, but it's not actually taught. This is because the teachers aren't prepared to teach foreign languages.
Kids living in the cities on the coast in the Northeast might learn to speak some german or english in order to interact with the tourists in thos regions. They might learn these languages in the streets in the afternoon, giving tourists directions or advice in exchange for tips.
The reading/writing learning process is similar. ALthough portugese grammar is much more complex than English.
Most kids can read/write basic things by the end of their schooling, but aren't able to really write full, formal portugese when they graduate.
It's very hard to get from the public schools into the university. You have to take national exams, and she said she'd never seen anybody who went directly from the public school system into the University. Some people take 1 year intensive courses to prepare themselves.
She suggested I read some Paulo Freire (pronounced Fray-ree, not Free-air), who was an educator from the NE of Brazil who, in the 60s, developed lots of methods to teach kids to read/write. He was forced to leave the country. His methodology is still being used there. It's contstructivist.
One of the problems with learning to read/write is that kids don't want to focus on things like grapes (which they've never seen) or middle class behaviors that aren't relevant to them. They are more interested in words for fishing, the forest, etc.
There was some movement at some point to incorporate the social context into the pedagogical strategies.
I should ask either Paola or Valeria about Friere (I forget who).
Schools tend to be in towns, made of brick, maybe no windows, depending on climate. They have electricity, running water, and a bathroom in schools usually.
Kids come via bike, boat, etc. 20-30 minutes.
There is a blackboard and chalk, and that's about it for teaching materials.
Kids sit at desks. Sometimes they have to share.
Somtimes one teacher is teaching four grades at once. You could have kids 7-12 in one room together.
In urban areas there is a little more infrastructure.
I should read:
I should watch: