EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGIES AND ETHICAL FORMATION: PATHS TOWARD A CRITICAL AND RESPONSIBLE USE

Abstract

This article aimed to investigate how ethical formation can guide a critical and responsible use of educational technologies in the contemporary Brazilian context. It starts from the understanding that the massive presence of digital technologies in education, far from being neutral, carries ethical implications regarding privacy, equity, autonomy, and the formation of critical thinking, which makes a merely instrumental or technical approach insufficient. The methodology consisted of a qualitative and exploratory bibliographic review, surveying official documents, regulations, and open-access empirical studies published between 2021 and 2026, articulated with critical pedagogical thought, especially of a Freirean matrix. The results reveal a worrying mismatch between the accelerated adoption of technologies and the ethical maturity that should accompany it: national data indicate that most students use digital tools without formal guidance, while international organizations point out that fewer than one tenth of educational institutions have their own usage policies. It is concluded that ethical formation, understood as a continuous and dialogical process directed at both teachers and students, constitutes the central condition for technology to become an instrument of emancipation, rather than of dependence, surveillance, or exclusion.