Rural education and the memory of the elderly: navigating between the past and present

Abstract

The article analyzes the pedagogical experience of the Escola Família Agrícola Avani de Lima Cunha (EFA), a farming school sponsored by the Associação de Desenvolvimento Sustentável e Solidário da Região Sisaleira (Association for Sustainable and Solidary Development of the Sisaleira Region) - APAEBValente, Bahia, and analyzes, in particular, a research experience in which the EFA community school, its teachers and students act as protagonists in the reconstruction of the collective memory of communities. The methodology involved articulating the pedagogical strategies of the EFA, to promote dialogue between students and elderly residents in a dynamic way that enabled the history of families and communities to be constructed, throughout the history of the drought, the properties and education. The results indicate a recognition and incorporation of knowledge and experience of the elderly into the educational process, according to a movement in which the school community appropriates the knowledge produced in its region, acting as a producer of new knowledge by placing the school, and education, at the heart of this process of forming roots and a sense of belonging.