SPECIAL EDUCATION IN THE NATIONAL COMMON CURRICULUM BASE: REFLECTIONS ON THE CURRICULUM AND THE PLACE THAT DIFFERENT SUBJECTS OCCUPY IN THE DOCUMENT
curriculum; adaptation; Flexibilization; BNCC; Special education
It is common in the daily life of the classroom to hear the terms “adapt” and “loosen” the
curriculum for students in Special Education. Officially, the teacher has the obligation to align
the content given to the Common National Curriculum Base (BNCC) (BRASIL, 2017), the
most important document for Basic Education to the needs of the subjects included in the
school. However, there is not always a reflection on how this adaptation or curricular
flexibility occurs in pedagogical practice. For this reason, the general objective of the
research is to understand what orientations and contributions the BNCC brings to the
teacher in relation to the adapted and flexible curriculum aimed at Special Education.
Therefore, we built our theoretical framework on “curriculum”, considered as contested
territory, based on authors such as Santomé (1995), Silva (1999), Sacristán (2000), Lopes
and Macedo (2011), Candau (2002), Traversini et al. (2007), Mesquita (2010), Arroyo
(2013), Oliveira (2016) and Saviani (2016). The theoretical discussion on “inclusive
curriculum” was based on Vigotski (1995), Glat e Blanco (2007), Mendes (2010), França
(2013) and Capellini (2018). This is a qualitative research with a documentary character,
having as a primary object of investigation the BNCC document. Through an exploratory
reading of the text of the BNCC, the most important guidelines, mentions, clues and excerpts
that were related to the theme were sought. In addition, to collaborate with the debate, a
literature review was carried out using the Coordination of the Improvement of Higher-level
Staff (CAPES) Theses and Dissertations Bank on the adapted and flexible curriculum in an
inclusive perspective. For the treatment of data and information collected during the
research, the Content Analysis of Bardin (1976) was used. After placing the base in the
context of curriculum policies in Brazil, we accounted, organized and analyzed the text of
the document using the following keywords: adaptation, adapt, adjust, flexibilizacion,
flexibility, diversity, inclusion, curriculum, special education and inclusive education. We
conclude that, the terms “adaptation” and “flexibility” are not treated as they should, causing
confusion in their meanings, and that there is no reflection and theoretical understanding
about what they mean and about its application in pedagogical practice. Furthermore, the
BNCC proved to be homogeneous, contradictory, superficial, based on a universal subject,
leaving explicit business interests and the commodification of education.