“Our body is directly connected to our teaching practice”: training processes in early childhood education⁹¹⁰

Abstract

This article presents data from a postdoctoral research project that analyzed the perceptions of Early Childhood Education teachers from a municipal public school system regarding training processes mediated by experiences involving the body and movement, and their possible repercussions on educational-pedagogical action with children. Studies on the subject have shown that formative experiences involving the body and movement are scarce, both in initial teacher education programs and in continuing education. The descriptive memorials written by 49 Early Childhood Education teachers comprised the corpus of the analysis, which was examined through Grounded Theory. The emerging categories were i) connection with reality; and ii) body: presences and absences. The teachers’ narratives show the relevance of continuing education sessions that mobilize reflections and experiences that dialogue with pedagogical practices and the children’s demands. They also emphasize that, despite the processes of (re)construction, reflection and (re)signification that take place in the individual context of each teacher, what mobilizes them are the face-to-face and collective continuing education encounters. In addition, they highlight the potential of experiences involving the body and movement in training processes, since the engagement and appreciation of body-mediated experiences, are proportional to the attribution of meaning by professionals.

Keywords:
Body; Teacher training; Early childhood education.

Resumo

No presente artigo, apresentam-se dados de uma pesquisa em nível de pós-doutorado que analisou as percepções de professoras da Educação Infantil de uma rede municipal de ensino público sobre os processos formativos mediados por experiências que implicassem o corpo e o movimento, bem como suas possíveis repercussões na ação educativo-pedagógica com as crianças. Estudos sobre a temática evidenciaram que experiências formativas que implicam o corpo e o movimento são escassas, tanto nos cursos de formação inicial quanto nas formações continuadas. Os memoriais descritivos elaborados por 49 professoras da Educação Infantil compuseram o corpus de análise, apreciados por meio da Teoria Fundamentada nos Dados. As categorias que emergiram foram: i) conexão com a realidade; e ii) corpo: presenças e ausências. As narrativas das docentes evidenciam a relevância de encontros de formação continuada que mobilizem reflexões e vivências que dialoguem com as ações educativas pedagógicas do contexto educacional e com as demandas das crianças. Ressaltam, ainda, que, apesar dos processos de (re)construção, reflexão e (re)significação que ocorrerem no âmbito individual de cada professora, o que as mobiliza são os encontros de formação continuada presenciais e coletivos. Além disso, destacam a potência de experiências que envolvem o corpo e o movimento nos processos formativos, uma vez que o envolvimento e a valorização das vivências mediadas pelo corpo são proporcionais à atribuição de sentido pelas profissionais.

Palavras-chave:
Corpo; Formação de professores; Educação infantil.

Introduction

This paper uses data collected by a postdoctoral research project to analyze Early Childhood Education teachers’ perceptions of Teacher Education processes mediated by experiences involving the body and movement and their repercussions on educational-pedagogical practices with children in a public city school system.

Our study is based on the assumption that Teacher Education processes involving the body and movement in Early Childhood Education not only help teachers understand their own bodies, but also increase their sensitivity and awareness of teaching practices, as shown by a participant’s inspiring narrative introduced in the title of the paper, “Our bodies are intimately connected with our teaching practices”⁴. Teacher Education processes mediated by experiences involving the body and movement may support teachers’ understanding, broaden their views of themselves, the others and the world and impact their educational-pedagogical relations and practices.

From this perspective, keeping our focus on continuing Teacher Education mediated by the body and movement, our assumption is that “the body and arts express children’s imagination and multiple languages; this is the reason why initial and continuing Teacher Education programs must commit to these elements” (Santos; Rosa, 2021, p. 251). To engage with the empirical data, we drew on a theoretical framework that contributed to the analysis of the phenomenon under investigation, mainly continuing Teacher Education mediated by the body and movement and their interfaces (Franzé; Rossi, 2022; Souza, 2021; Oliveira, 2023; Gardin; Araújo, 2020).

This paper is divided into sections whose beginning comprises the contextualization of the theme of the study, the context and instrument of research and the data analysis methodology. Afterwards, we introduce some concepts and conceptions about the body and Teacher Education that guided our study. In the section of data analysis and discussion, we examine two categories that emerged from the study: i) connection with reality; and ii) body: presences and absences. The former emerged from the need that teachers perceived to intertwine their pedagogical practices and theoretical discussions about Education, mainly themes that engage with everyday reality in school. The latter emphasizes the body - its presence and its absence - and the power it exerts in continuing Teacher Education meetings.

Concepts and conceptions: body, Teacher Education and teaching

We believe that we should bring up some conceptions about core concepts of this study since they influence reading and understanding of the text. Larossa (2021, p. 16) points out that words have an incredible strength and power: “we do things with words and words also do things with us. Words determine our thinking since we do not think with thoughts, but with words”. The study that led to this paper was based on the assumption that the body has a privileged space in the educational process and in human development.

This perspective means viewing and understanding children beyond the mechanistic and dualist perspective that the schooling process has taught us. We must advance and view both body and mind as a single unit, rather than treating the former merely as the base of the latter. The notions of “[…] subject-body and hybridity between nature and culture help us to view the body from a more complex perspective, i. e., that it is the product and, at the same time, the generator of several processes, such as biological, psychological social and cultural ones” (Arenhart, 2016, p. 100-101).

Therefore, regarding discissions about the body, “[...] I do not do it to merely designate the material dimension of the human being - the flesh - but, mainly, cultural constructions that it originates and produces” (Sayão, 2008, p. 94). Considering children’s educational experiences in Early Childhood Education, we believe that this space is powerful to constitute their physical repertoire. Both teacher’s and children’s bodies have been historically conditioned to docility processes and discipline in educational institutions for control purposes (Soares, 2005). We keep perceiving traces of the traditional approach to teaching which focuses on the teacher and on directive practices that aim at adjusting and standardizing bodies and behavior in specific spaces and time (Silva; Bersch, 2022). The authors highlight that such conceptions come from the Cartesian dualism which does not view body and mind as a single unit, but as fragments that lead us to mistakenly privilege predominantly cognitive tasks and underprivilege the wide range and amalgam of affective, motor, emotional and social dimensions that constitute human beings - teachers and children (Silva; Bersch, 2022).

Buss-Simão (2014) explains that this tension is also found in everyday Early Childhood Education regarding the care-education dichotomy. It corroborates the fact that a more “noble” status is given to tasks related to the cognitive dimension while a less “noble” one is given to those related to care for children’s bodies. We believe that dialogue, discussion and experience mediated by the body in proposals of initial and continuing Teacher Education programs may deconstruct them and other crystallized concepts which constitute many teachers’ systems of beliefs.

Historically speaking, the body was viewed either as biological inheritance provided by nature or as cultural and social construction. Both dimensions were studied and understood separately since interactions were ignored for a long time. When we consider the body as nature, emphasis is given to homogeneity while the influence of class, gender, ethnicity and culture on its development is ignored. It results in homogenizing educational approaches which disregard individual specificities (Mendes; Nóbrega, 2004).

From another perspective, the body is viewed as a historical and cultural construction whose experience and Education is shaped by relevant factors, such as the historical context, society and culture. This view opposes biological determinism and acknowledges the importance of social and cultural influences. However, sometimes there is excessive denial of the biological contribution, a fact which results in certain aversion to the biological aspect of life, as highlighted by Schilling (2008) and Turner (1996).

The search for understanding the body in a less dichotomized and fragmented way is the need pointed out by several researchers, such as James, Jenks and Prout (2000), Le Breton (2003, 2012, 2019), Mendes and Nóbrega (2004), Ribeiro (2003), Silva (1999), Schilling (2008) and Turner (1996). They state that the body must be viewed as an interconnection in which nature and culture keep relations of mutual production. Such scholars highlight that human beings must be considered in their biocultural wholeness since they are simultaneously constituted as totally biological and totally cultural. In other words, in human beings, the biological is constituted by culture.

The dichotomized and fragmented view of the body restricts social interventions, mainly in Education, when it does not acknowledge the complexity of the interaction between nature and culture in its constitution. This fact reflects on Early Childhood Education, the stage in which educational-pedagogical practices related to the body are often belittled to the detriment of those that are considered “pedagogical”. We advocate that studies of the body must be given the space they deserve in the educational dimension because the body yields knowledge; through “[...] gestures, mimes, attitudes, looks, shifts […], it carries meaning” (Le Breton, 2019, p. 53). Therefore, it is coherent and necessary that such themes become effective in Teacher Education.

Studies that focus on both initial and continuing Teacher Education programs (Guedes, 2018; Sabbag, 2017; Santos; Rosa, 2021; Sayão, 2008; Barbosa, 2015; Souza, 2021) have informed and warned us that educational proposals that center the body as a key component of learning are scarce. It is even aggravated when we refer to physical experiences as practices.

Bersch et al. (2025) carried out a study with Early Childhood Education teachers attending a continuing Teacher Education program whose core axis was body practices, movement, language and body language experienced by the teachers in the meetings. The authors showed that, regarding Teacher Education, “[…] it is more meaningful to give teachers the opportunity of using and experiencing their bodies than merely listening and talking about children’s games and activities by means of speeches and live online programs. Therefore, resulting practice and subjectivity may give sense to what we call experience, which, according to Bondía (2002, p. 21) “[...] is what goes through us, what happens to us, what touches us”. The teachers who participated in the study conducted by Bersch et al. (2025) mentioned that, based on the different material and proposals whose core axis was the body, they were able to get inspiration and propose similar activities to children in their educational contexts.

Sabbag (2017) stated that teachers highlighted their invisibilized and unknown bodies when they revealed how little they knew about them. Underestimating the body is a characteristic of the whole modern western society, rather than merely teachers’ (Le Breton, 2003). We have been taught to control our bodies, to be quiet and to overlook our physical needs to take on a culturally learned and socially accepted attitude unquestioningly since childhood unquestioningly. As a result, we do not have true knowledge of our bodies; we do not notice their/our needs unless they are expressed and realized in moments of pain, movement restriction and intense pleasure.

Another important data highlighted by Sabbag (2017) refers to the fact that the body is either not included or vaguely included in both initial and continuing Teacher Education programs. When the theme is included in the programs, Early Childhood Education teachers who participated in the study mentioned another gap: “they were dissatisfied because the initial and continuing Teacher Education programs they took part in approach the theme superficially and, when it is dealt with, their needs are not fully met” (Sabbag 2017, p. 13).

In this section, we aimed at tensioning the relevance and the impact of Teacher Education; emphasis was given to continuing Teacher Education programs, but initial ones were not neglected. The studies we pointed out show the significant impact of teachers’ educational experiences mediated by the body on children’s educational processes.

We agree with Bersch et al. (2025, p. 05) who stated that “if we wish teachers to be creative, authorial, inventive, we must teach them, or, at least, provoke them”. Keeping these issues in mind to guide our study, we now introduce our methodological choices and analyze the data on Early Childhood Education teachers.

Research pathways and methodological procedures

Regarding the methodology and procedures used for developing this study, firstly we presented the proposal to the Office of Early Childhood Education at the City Department of Education in Florianópolis, SC, Brazil, to get its approval. Afterwards, we submitted the project to the Research Ethics Committee at the Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina (UFSC)¹¹, located in the same city.

The link with the questions to access the descriptive memorial structured as guiding questions created by Google Forms¹² and the invitation letter were sent to the Office of Early Childhood Education. This office then sent them to all Early Childhood Education Centers via e-mail. The first five questions referred to identification, degrees and practice. The next ten questions aimed not only at knowing teachers’ conception and the relevance they gave to continuing Teacher Education, but also educational experiences that included their bodies and movement together with repercussions on their educational-pedagogical practices with children. Data under analysis come from descriptive memorials answered by 49 Early Childhood Education teachers.

Driving questions of descriptive memorials aimed at collecting teachers’ individual narratives about the repercussion of their participation on educational practices in Early Childhood Education since “through narrative, people remember what happened, list experiences in a sequence, find explanations to what happened and play with the chain of events that construct individual and social life” (Jovchelovitch; Bauer, 2002, p. 91). Besides, writing narratives in the descriptive memorials enables teachers to reflect upon themselves, their constitution and at the same “[…] time, make sense of their experiences, their learning and even acknowledge their failures in these attempts” (Passeggi, 2021, p. 96).

All participants who answered the descriptive memorial worked in the public city school system in Florianopolis, SC, Brazil, whose Early Childhood Education institutions are called City Early Childhood Education Centers. They provide full-time and part-time care to children from 0 to 5;11 years old. Early Childhood Education in the public city school system in Florianópolis, SC had 96 Early Childhood Education Centers in 2022; 10 out of 96 were connected¹³ to Elementary Schools.

To analyze data collected by 49 descriptive memorials, we used the Grounded Theory which advocates that researchers constantly (re)construct and (re)signify themselves through interrelations and interventions made by their studies. Charmaz (2009, p. 24-25) states that “[...] we construct our theories by means of our engagement and interaction with people, research perspectives and practices, both past and present ones”.

We chose the Grounded Theory because, in principle, it enables researchers to understand their participants’ worlds from their personal perspectives (Glaser, 2011). Its name suggests that it emerges from real-world data; thus, categories and excerpts that support them represent what participants actually mention.

To illustrate the exercise, the whole content collected by the descriptive memorial was subject to an analytical process which comprised the following stages: a) initial coding; b) focused coding; c) axial coding or connection among categories; d) pre-categories; e) categories; and f) story writing (Charmaz, 2009). This meticulous exercise means that care for data production is as important as the analytical process: “the methodological rigor proposed by this approach enables facts/data to be transformed into theory, into plausible and understandable scientific knowledge” (Bersch; Yunes; Piske, 2022, p. 239).

Forty-nine teachers¹⁴ whose ages range between 23 and 57 years old and who teach different groups of children took part in the study. They have worked in Early Childhood Education in the public school system from 5 to 20 years, on average. Regarding their undergraduate courses, 67.3% took in-person courses while 28.6% took online ones and the other teachers attended distinct types of courses, such as hybrid ones.

We should point out that the participants have worked with groups of children from four months to one year old (G1) to six years old (G6). Concerning percentages, 49% have already worked with G1 children; 67.3% with G2 children; 75.5% with G3; 67.3% with G4; 71.4% with G5; and 65.3% with G6. In other words, most teachers have already worked with all groups of children. In this text, participants are identified as Teacher and a number (ordered by the date their data were received).

Throughout the text, as in a patchwork quilt, we craft dialogues between us and the teachers by extracting excerpts (in italics and in quotes) from their descriptive memorials about the conception, relevance, important aspects, significant physical experiences in continuing Teacher Education to work with children in Early Childhood Education. Therefore, after data organization, the following categories emerged: i) connection with reality; and ii) body: presences and absences.

On Continuing Teacher Education: if it makes you feel, it makes sense!

The category connection with reality emerged forcefully in the analytical process since teachers’ answers converged on the need for “[…] articulation between experience in pedagogical practices and theoretical discussions in the field of education” (teacher 11) while addressing “themes that […] resonates with the reality found in the institution” (teacher 25). thus, “[…] relating the teacher education process to the practice with the children” (teacher 31) to promote “intertwinement between the theme and […] concerns about the […] practice” (teacher 7).

The excerpts show teachers’ search for continuing Education processes that deal with themes and issues related to what they experience in everyday life and that make sense to them. Le Breton (2016, p. 27) points out that “only what makes sense, be it negligible or essential, enters the field of conscience and raises some attention”. Such perception is also mentioned by teachers when they refer to what they believe is fundamental in their educational processes: “[…] to enable to broaden my knowledge and introduce new insights into my pedagogical practices” (Teacher 24) and “[…] to make sense to my practice, to make sense to my self-knowledge” (Teacher 44). The narratives corroborate that “[…] what is learned can only be appropriated by the subject if it arouses certain echoes in him: if it makes sense to him” (Charlot, 2001, p. 21).

On one hand, the issues raised by the teachers are not original in the field of Education. On the other hand, they show the need to study, reflect and discuss “[…] the theory to align it with the practice” (Teacher 16). Such theme has led to much discussion in the field of Teacher Education (Lüdke; Ivenicki, 2022; Tardif; Lessard; Gauthier, 2001; Freire, 1991, 1996, 2013).

Paulo Freire (2013), the patron of Brazilian Education, made us reflect upon the relation between theory and practice in Education. Fortuna (2015, p. 64) explains that, when Freire referred to this relation, he called it praxis: “[…] it means that, at the same time, the subject acts/reflects and, when he reflects, he acts, or, in other words, the subject moves from the theory to practice and, from his practice, generates new theory, thus, theory and practice are constructed together, they perpetuate in praxis”.

Data collected by this study show that the implementation of praxis keeps being a challenge and a concern for teachers in the field of Education nowadays. Furthermore, “[…] it is a right and a duty; it is a strong need to deepen initial Teacher Education and discuss comprehensive and specific themes that pertain to the everyday reality we work with” (Teacher 24). Teachers need spaces that may foster “[...]reflection which help me re-think my pedagogical work” (Teacher 49).

Such perception and the search for “[...] possibilities that broaden […] knowledge and add new insights to the […] pedagogical practice” (Teacher 25) are clear in participants’ records when they list elements that they value when they choose continuing Teacher Education programs. The following data were considered predominant: “[...] intertwinement among the theme, my concerns about my practice, updated discussions and meaningful moments that may qualify and broaden my repertoire” (Teacher 7); “themes that aim at contributing to experiences in which I am involved and themes that help our everyday school life” (Teacher 10); “theme, content, methodology, professors’ experience, connection with our professional reality” (Teacher 12); and “situations experienced in the institutions” (Teacher 13). Teachers’ narratives refer to clues and outcomes of educational programs which were stated by Nóvoa (2019, p. 11):

It is in the complexity of an educational program whose development is based on professional experiences and cultures where we may find a way out of teachers’ dilemmas. Amid several doubts and much hesitation, there is a certainty that guides us: school metamorphosis always takes place when teachers join to reflect on their work […]. Continuing Teacher Education must not reject any contribution that comes from outside […], but it is in the school where it is defined and enriched, thus, it may play its role in teachers’ professional development.

From this perspective, data under analysis showed that teachers believe that to know, to talk, to analyze “[…] specific projects which take place in the school” (Teacher 12) may create opportunities to reflect on educational-pedagogical strategies and activities “[…] that aim at […] the daily practice and support assertive approaches” (Teacher 24). If we consider the assumption that “[…] to know different realities and practices may lead to discussions which broaden our views” (Teacher 21), undoubtedly the result will be “[…] significant continuing Teacher Education meetings” (Teacher 27).

When Paulo Freire (1991, p. 58) wrote about being a teacher, he stated that: “nobody starts to be an educator on a certain Tuesday at 4 pm. Nobody is born an educator, neither destined to be an educator. We become educators in our practice and through our reflection on our practice”. The search for knowledge qualification, deepening and re-signification is a keynote for the group of teachers who participated in this study when they narrate their expectations related to continuing Teacher Education.

Educational processes “[…] represent a space of constant construction and re-construction of educational-pedagogical relations” (Teacher 22) and make us “[…] deconstruct crystallized work paradigms and methodologies” (Teacher 20). “It is a process of continuing reflection on practice, it represents an opportunity to reflect on it” (Teacher 27); besides, it is the “[…] possibility of re-signifying, broadening and re-constructing views” (Teacher 38).

Proposals of continuing Teacher Education must foresee “[…] a continuing process of reflection on practice; it represents an opportunity to reflect on practice” (Teacher 27) or “[…] learning and relating theory to practice” (Teacher 43) in order to re-signify praxis in one’s pedagogical work. These records are a constant in the participants’ narratives which also carry the terms living and experience recurrently.

In the attempt of understanding the meaning of the term, Larossa (2021, p. 10) explains that “[…] experience is something that happens to us and that, sometimes, either shivers or vibrates, something that makes us think, something that makes us suffer or enjoy, something that fights for expression […] and transcends time and space”. The author draws attention to the fact that information is not experience; it may almost be characterized as anti-experience. Thus, we must clarify that experience and information are different things. We may attend a class, a conference, take a trip, visit a nursery, pre-school or school and say that, after these moments, we know things that we did not know before, but, at the same time, we may say that nothing touched us, nothing happened, i. e., there was no experience (Larossa, 2021).

We insist on the term experience because our initial assumption is that the motto of Teacher Education should be “significant experiences [considering that, in the participants’ opinions,] practicing the content makes the themes more meaningful and understandable to be applied” (Teacher 47). “Exchange of experiences [among teachers] which takes place in this space [Teacher Education meetings] is very important and significant” (Teacher 33).

From this perspective, experiencing may reverberate significantly through everyday educational-pedagogical tasks with children attending Early Childhood Education since “[…] some tips and/or experiences reported by other teachers could be implemented in my practice” (Teacher 13). It revealed that “[…] teachers’ experiences touched them and, one way or another, such sensitization may echo in schools, in direct contact with children” (Ehrenberg; Ayoub, 2020, p. 17).

Some memories of meaningful experiences in Teacher Education meetings reported by teachers in their narratives show that they represent “[…] opportunities of dialogue, exchange with other teachers, knowledge of practices implemented by professionals who work in different centers and their proposals” (Teacher 44). Thus, “[…] sense is produced when relations are established either in a system or in relations with the world or with others” (Charlot, 2000, p. 56), coordinated by “[…] dedicated professionals who bring examples of their lives, experiences” (Teacher 46) “[…] related to pedagogical practices” (Teacher 28).

Experience goes through the body of the one who lives it. In the study conducted by Ehrenberg and Ayoub (2020), physical experiences were able to generate distinct senses; as a result, they became memorable experiences for the teachers since they declared that they were impacted and sensitized by the experiences and acknowledged the power of such practices in their Education and professional life. It is through the body that human beings make the world become the extension of their experiences: “either transmitter or receiver, the body produces feelings continuously and immerses the man [sic] actively within a certain social and cultural space” (Le Breton, 2012, p. 8). Based on this assumption, we now engage in the category body: presences and absences.

Body and teaching: “adulthood steals the playful subject that inhabits us”

The second category that emerged from the analytical process refers to the body: presences and absences, but, mainly to its power, which is highlighted by teachers’ narratives. The sentence in the subtitle of this section, which was extracted from a narrative, set the tone not only for the absences, but also for the potentiality that may characterize continuing Teacher Education.

On one hand, continuing Teacher Education that privileges the body “[…] is extremely necessary to make us reflect on how the ‘adulthood’ process steals the playful subject that inhabits us, our sensitivity” (Teacher 17). On the other hand, its absence in Teacher Education processes “[…] stiffens us and often prevents us from donating us physically to our educational-pedagogical practices in the interaction with children” (Teacher 17).

The narratives emphasize significant memories marked by physical experiences. When teachers report echoes of educational processes mediated by the body, they highlight: “[…] they enabled us to contemplate our bodies as a learning object […], to experience a meaningful proposal of the body” (Teacher 7), “[…] because our bodies are the main elements that we must take care of” (Teacher 5).

In Sabbag’s study (2017), teachers also revealed that the body is a core element in teachers’ relations in Early Childhood Education. However, teachers pay little attention to it. Sabbag (2017, p. 17) points out that the data showed that “[…] teachers’ bodies are affected by job requirements and, as a result, they affect relations established with children”.

Similar results were also found by the study reported by this paper since it showed that neither what the body represents/means in Teacher Education processes nor its repercussion on educational processes is understood. Regarding processes that privilege the body, “[…] I only remember them in my undergraduate course. I think I view body language in a restricted way” (Teacher 8).

We must keep in mind that teachers’ understanding of the body and corporeity in educational relations has a direct impact on choices of educational-pedagogical tasks. It should be pointed out that just 12 out of 49 teachers reported the fact that they participated in some Teacher Education processes that involved the body; even so, in specific ways. This data gets more relevant when it is considered together with the fact that studies of initial and continuing Teacher Education, such as the one carried out by Souza (2021, p. 304) in teacher degree courses, have shown that there is no discussion about the body. The author highlighted “[...] silencing of the body, movement and the absence of educational-pedagogical tasks that privilege corporeity in Higher Education curricula”.

In his Master’s dissertation, Barbosa (2015) investigated the body in initial Teacher Education in the Pedagogy curricula in Brazilian federal universities and found 27 disciplines that address the body in 18 out of 47 universities. It shows that most educational processes in Pedagogy, which graduate Early Childhood Education teachers, do not offer educational processes mediated by experiences involving the body and movement. Some studies have highlighted that many experiences of teachers-to-be, either in basic Education or in Higher Education, undergo the control of expressivity and potentiality of their own bodies, as pointed out by Strazzacappa (2001, p. 70): “the idea of discipline in school has always been understood as non-movement. Polite and well-behaved children were the ones who simply did not move”.

Concerning body indoctrination, Silva and Ferreira (2020) introduced the idea of an “appendix body”, i. e., the body that serves as an assistant for the mind and the cognitive dimension. Almeida and Flores-Pereira (2013) also reflected on the theme and emphasized that, although many studies advocate the mind-body connection, there are few studies that actually propose a methodological reflection which integrates them.

However, we must advance new proposals, i. e., enable teachers to undergo physical experiences so that, based on their bodies, they may create, invent, subvert stereotyped and standardized movements. The assumption of the fact that children explore, live, express and know themselves through their bodies, means that teachers must go through educational processes mediated by experiences involving the body and movement and their repercussions on educational-pedagogical practices with children:

The need to bring different languages, and here we are talking about body language along with the others, enables Early Childhood Education teachers to get closer to children and broaden their views on the distinct possibilities of learning (Teacher 21).

It is a gap in my practice. I feel that I need to search theoretically for experiences related to body expression, since children are movements and we end up letting this language on its own, as if it would happen naturally. A great mistake (Teacher 18).

Teacher 18’s narrative gains strength and meaning when we recall Guedes’s contribution (2018) which refers to the fact that involvement in different body dynamics not only enables cultural and communicative deconstruction or reconstruction of the body, but also opportunities for teachers to acknowledge their own bodies. The author adds that being aware of body posture, movement patterns, muscle tension and support spots allows us to use our expression resources and our body as essential ways to communicate with and relate to others.

On one hand, teachers understand that continuing Teacher Education programs mediated by experiences involving the body and movement are “[…] relevant and significant because we have got limited knowledge in this scope” (Teacher 45) and “[…] important and fundamental in Teacher Education, mainly in the field of Early Childhood Education, because they retrieve body movements which we often disregard, by comparison with issues related to theory” (Teacher 20). On the other hand, teachers highlight that, although “[…] they comprise a relevant path, opportunities are scarce” (Teacher 10).

Despite teachers’ acknowledgement and efforts to broaden educational-pedagogical proposals related to the body and their constant search for “[…] less repressive Education in Early Education, some forms of control, such as fixed schedules, routine and, somehow, maintenance of order, have still been used” (Sabbag, 2017, p. 50). Interest in the body and movement in Teacher Education and in everyday work in nurseries, pre-schools and schools has emerged.

In this scenario, Souza (2021, p. 304) points out that teachers-to-be have had few experiences focusing on the body “[…] and on body language in Early Childhood Education; thus, they tend to perpetuate their own crystallized discourses based on Cartesian rationalism whose assumption is a homogeneous, single, docile and sanitized body”: “I have already gone through physical experiences, but they took place in the pandemic and, because we used Google Meet¹⁵, we could not experience them completely, the way they had been idealized” (Teacher 35).

Teachers’ narratives show the urge and signs related to

[...] the need to make Pedagogy courses value discussions about the body in all its dimensions because we believe that this discussion about the body at the beginning of Pedagogy also contributes to make professionals understand their own bodies and increase their sensitivity, a fact that may contribute to their teaching practice, and to acknowledge their importance to educational processes (Silva; Buss-Simão, 2019, p. 10).

We believe that, to de-crystallize and deconstruct these principles, continuing Teaching Education must be significant to teachers. An Education process that makes sense, that is an experience (Larossa, 2021), that triggers emotions (Le Breton, 2019), that makes teachers belong to “[…] the construction process of their conceptions and activities, which means that corporeity is considered through physical experiences and reflection on themselves, provided by educational practices” (Franzé; Rossi, 2022, p. 313).

Teacher’s narratives showed us that there is power in experiences involving the body, movement and educational processes, since “[…] the more the body is involved, the more meaningful and deeper they are” (Teacher 34). Besides, “[…] I can only work with what I know; knowing my body and respecting its limits enable me to work/explore games while respecting/taking care of children’s bodies” (Teacher 36). The narratives we collected, mainly the ones sent by Teachers 34 and 36, corroborate findings reported by Ehrenberg and Ayoub (2020), i. e., teachers’ experiences, mainly with the body, had a deep impact on their constitution and sensitized them. The authors highlight that the teachers reported the fact that they were deeply affected and sensitized by educational experiences involving the body and movement; as a result, they acknowledged the power of such processes to constitute them in their professional work with children (Ehrenberg; Ayoub, 2020).

“Teachers’ experiences in Teacher Education are decisive to broaden, diversify experiences and knowledge and to promote teachers’ full development, as well as children’s, since a child is body in movement!” (Teacher 29).

Our bodies communicate through expressive gestures and reveal ourselves, our affections, (non-)availabilities and emotional states. They carry stories, memories that manifest physically in tension felt by muscles, tendons and organs and in the breathing pattern. Certain problems, such as low back tightness, difficulty sitting on the floor and excessive tiredness during vigorous tasks, show the need to go through experiences that broaden understanding of our bodies. When we broaden our experiences, movement skills and body awareness, we also increase our possibilities of participating in games, contacts, exchanges, symbolic constructions and relations with children (Guedes, 2018). These issues are recurrent in studies of childhood, mainly Early Childhood Education, but they are not always deepened, especially regarding the fact that it is important for teachers to play, move, interact and experience with¹⁶ children (Mello et al., 2021).

Final remarks

Based on the analysis of both categories - connection with reality and body: presences and absences -, we aimed at exposing Early Childhood Education teachers’ perceptions of Teacher Education processes mediated by experiences involving the body and movement. Considering the data we collected, it should be highlighted that teachers’ educational processes just make sense to them and echo in educational-pedagogical tasks when they become experiences, i. e., when they make teachers feel, reflect and re-signify in realities and contexts they face.

It should also be pointed out that, although reconstruction, reflection and resignification processes take place in every teacher’s individual dimension, what inspires them are collective continuing Teacher Education meetings. It is in the group of people who are willing to talk and interact where significant experiences happen and produce changes to qualify Early Childhood Education.

The data also showed that educational experiences involving the body and movement are scarce in both initial and continuing Teacher Education programs. However, even scarce, few experiences may be significant since they sensitize and make teachers look at their bodies and propose educational-pedagogical tasks that broaden and diversify children’s experiences with the body and movement.

The field of Teacher Education has historically oscillated between advances and setbacks. There has been an advance in the transition from merely informative models to reflective ones which value teachers’ experience and subjectivity. However, by comparison with analyses carried out by previous studies, there is a latent setback in the trend to conduct short virtual meetings. We reiterate that previous studies also showed the relevance of collective Teacher Education processes, which this study endorses. Even though the reflection process is individual, group sharing and interaction make teachers’ practices become more effective and consolidated. We point out that the absence of the body, which has been neglected by public policies on Teacher Education, emerged in this study as a warning. Teacher Education programs that do not consider/privilege the body are less significant to teachers.

Qualitative studies that focus on specific topics have limits that must be considered. Since this investigation was carried out with a group of teachers in a certain context, its data cannot be statistically generalized. Besides, time to observe the impact of Teacher Education programs in institutions with children is a limit that was considered, but not totally solved because of the complexity to measure the length of subjective changes in the short run. Therefore, investigations should continue to explore the theme and increase the length and the number of in-person meetings. We also suggest the investigation of ways in which processes that privilege the body in Teacher Education processes can be incorporated into city and state public policies to enable comprehensive actions.

Finally, space must be given and experiences must be proposed to teachers in Teacher Education programs that privilege and value the body and movement. Teachers must feel, experience and perceive such benefits in their own bodies. Teachers’ narratives pointed out that only what they have experienced and to what they attributed sense throughout initial and continuing Teacher Education will take part in their repertoire of educational tasks with children.

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• 9
  English version by Lígia Beskow de Freitas. The authors take full responsibility for the translation of the text, including title of books/articles and the quotations originally published in Portuguese.
• 10
  Data availability: all data that support the results of this study have been included in this paper.
• 11
  - https://cep.ufsc.br/ - The study was approved by CAAE no. 69749223.0.0000.0121 and technical report no. 6.102.398.
• 12
  - Google Forms is a tool developed by Google to create formularies online.
• 13
  - Early Childhood Education Centers connected to Elementary Schools are the ones found in the structure of the school. Thus, they provide assistance to children from Early Childhood Education to Elementary School.
• 14
  - Out of 49 participants, only one is a male teacher.
• 15
  - Google Meetis a video conferencing service developed by Google.
• 16
  - Many studies of children in which adults speak for them have been carried out. We believe in another path since we advocate interventions and interactions with teachers so that their practices reflect on children.

Edited by

• Editor:
  Prof. Dr. Fábio de Barros Silva

Data availability

Data availability: all data that support the results of this study have been included in this paper.

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  08 May 2026
• Date of issue
  2026

History

• Received
  20 June 2025
• Reviewed
  03 Dec 2025
• Accepted
  23 Feb 2026