Teaching practices in Social Work: tensions and challenges of professional training

Abstract

This paper collects the main results of a research that proposed to know the teaching practices of the Social Work undergraduate program of the Alberto Hurtado University (Chile), recognizing the teaching-learning strategies, pedagogical resources, and the contributions that the teachers themselves visualize about their curricular activities. From a qualitative approach, with an exploratory scope and through a categorical content analysis, it was possible to build three lines of argumentation of results: reflections on the teaching work and university teaching, various repertoires of teaching-learning strategies and on training and updating of knowledge by the teachers. As main conclusions, it is possible to identify that teaching practices are a complex construction between professional experiences and pedagogical knowledge. Taking the main premise that teaching-learning strategies go beyond the merely didactic field, teachers represent in their practices the transition from a training focused on knowledge, towards a training focused on learning, and therefore, teachers already have an important basis for critical reflection to incorporate more consistent strategies for teaching Social Work.