WHEN THE CURRICULUM GAINS A VOICE: CONVERSATION CIRCLES, NARRATIVES AND THE PRODUCTION OF MEANINGS IN YOUTH AND ADULT EDUCATION

Abstract

This article analyzes conversation circles as a narrative, formative, and epistemological device for meaning-making about the curriculum in Youth and Adult Education (EJA). It is based on a section of a qualitative master’s research project conducted at a public school in Riacho de Santana, Bahia, involving 15 students and 12 teachers. The investigation combined documentary analysis, questionnaires, and conversation circles, whose narratives were examined through thematic analysis and source triangulation. The results showed that the circles made visible dimensions of the curriculum shaped by work, family, trajectories of exclusion, returning to school, pedagogical practices, and tensions between the prescribed and the lived curriculum. The findings indicate that, by narrating and listening to experiences, participants not only provided information but also reinterpreted their trajectories and produced shared understandings of the curriculum. The study concludes that conversation circles went beyond their instrumental function and became ethical, formative, and epistemological spaces for meaning-making.