Qualification exams carried out in the professional master’s program in mathematics in the national network

Abstract

Abstract This article analyzes the nature of the knowledge, especially that of a specialized nature, evoked in the solution of the questions that made up the National Qualification Exams (NQE), developed within the scope of the Professional Master’s Program in Mathematics in the National Network (PROFMAT), between the years 2012 and 2019. The focus of this program was based on the development of a solid education in Mathematics, which contemplates the needs arising from the daily lives of teachers in the school space and their broad needs for development and professional appreciation. Therefore, a qualitative study was developed in which, from the interpretative content analysis, a total of 62 questions were classified in the light of the conceptual-analytical model Mathematics Teachers’ Specialized Knowledge (MTSK), which composed the NQE applied in the first semester of the 8 years analyzed. The analysis carried out showed that: a) more than 70% of the questions focus exclusively on knowledge that appears in only one subdomain of Mathematical Knowledge (MK), the Knowledge of Topics, while only 5% of them address knowledge that appears in all subdomains of MK; b) Absence, in all questions, of knowledge associated with the Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) domain. Thus, it is concluded that the evaluation developed through the NQE privileges knowledge that appears only in one of the six subdomains of knowledge that really support the teacher in his daily work with mathematics, which is opposed to the results of many relevant studies that emphasize the importance and impact of knowledge associated with the PCK domain in teaching.