TOWARDS AN EDUCATION GROUNDED IN HUMAN RIGHTS: AN ARTICULATION WITH FREIRE-VYGOTSKY THOUGHT

Abstract

This study investigates the articulation between the premises of Paulo Freire and Lev Vygotsky to establish a foundation for Science Education based on Human Rights Education (HRE). The research, qualitative in nature, utilizes Discursive Textual Analysis (DTA) to examine how the principles of Human Rights Education are transposed into the Natural Sciences program of the Rio Grande do Norte Curricular Document (DCRN) for the final years of elementary school. The results show a predominance of the environmental dimension, focused on socio-environmental sustainability. However, we identified critical gaps in essential themes such as State secularism and democracy in education, which rarely appear explicitly in the field of Natural Sciences in the analyzed document. We conclude that Science Education must transcend the purely biological or technical aspect, incorporating social and political dimensions so that scientific literacy acts as an effective tool for guaranteeing rights and combating disinformation. We believe that the Freirean Thematic Approach, in dialogue with Vygotsky's socio-historical theory, can support curriculum reconstruction, promoting a more humanized, critical education consistent with the social and historical reality of the students.