School Representation in a Context of Poverty, Violence and Social Exclusion: What Do the Children Say about It?

Childhood, as a permanent category in society, is the most impacted group by the crises, wars, natural disasters and by all the inequalities in general. In addition, childhood as social category of the generation type is also structured by the others social categories, as ethnicity, race, gender. In order to understand the way children from a context of social exclusion in South Brazil build the relations with their school, we conducted a research focused on children’s points of view and knowledge about the representations they attributed to the institution based on their social belonging. Each child attributed a different meaning to the school formed by their experiences in life. In context surrounded by violence, poverty and exclusion children´s reveal that school is an important context of protection and learning for their present life, as well as perspectives for a better future from school attendance. To most of the children, school is the promise of a different future and is now, the only place where they can have a break from the problems they have in their lifes. By listening their voices, it was unveiled to us the impact of social inequalities in their lifes. In a country marked by huge social inequalities, listening to children’s voices is a way to understand how their lifes are affected by poverty, social exclusion and violence. Listening to children is also a way to affirm the competence of the children to provide an unique and accurate reading of reality. The research also revealed the agency of children to find protections mechanism between themselves.