The Children between the courts and between the lines:

academic production on childhood in the Physical Education course - UFMA

Abstract

The present research aims to map the main themes proposed in the academic productions of the Degree and Full Degree courses in Physical Education (PE) at the Federal University of Maranhão (UFMA), in São Luís – MA, in the period between 2002 and 2022. To this end, the methodology adopted was the categorical content analysis of Bardin (1997), based on a survey of Course Conclusion Papers (TCCs). Therefore, a sample universe of 411 TCCs was obtained, of which only 28 deal with topics related to children. From a detailed analysis of these works, four categories were established: a) Playfulness and/or pedagogical practice in PE; b) Sport, sports training and development of values ​​and/or motor aspects; c) Health and quality of life; d) Children's and/or school recreational culture. It was inferred that many of these studies adopt a biological perspective, which understands children as developing subjects, treating childhood as a phase of incompleteness. Symptomatically, the children were perceived as mere research samples, with their cultural productions and particular ways of perceiving the world not being protected. Thus, it is understood that it is necessary to advance studies, in the analyzed context, that treat children as active and autonomous subjects, as few TCCs analyzed adopt this perspective.