Fungos da Amazônia: um recurso didático para a graduação

Abstract

This research reflects the difficulties encountered in teaching Mycology and, more specifically, in its contextualization for the Amazonian scenario. Within the teaching of Mycology in higher education, the resources to be used are not specific to the discipline, since the majority of technical books in Portuguese are dedicated to the sub-area of Medical Mycology, intended for the training of health professionals. This approach reduces the understanding of the rich diversity and uses of fungi to a view of this group of living beings as pathogens and, therefore, harmful to people, plants and animals. In the quest to understand this scenario and propose teaching alternatives, this research aimed to develop a technical book for teaching Mycology in the Amazonian context and disseminate it through its own website, dedicated to Amazonian fungi. The research had a qualitative nature and was planned in two phases: the first included a systematic review of publications on fungi collected in the Amazon. The second, carried out a diagnosis in higher education institutions in the city of Manaus that offer courses with subjects that include Mycology, as well as the elaboration and testing of the proposal for a teaching resource in the form of a book and a website, making use of a newsstand of reviewers for their evaluation. The literature review was carried out using the keywords: “Amazon fungi”, “Amazon chytridiomycetes”, “zygomycetes in the Amazon”, “Amazon glomeromycetes”, “ascomycetes in the Amazon”, “Amazon basidiomycetes”, “deuteromycetes in the Amazon”, and “teaching Mycology in the Amazon”, combined together, on the electronic platforms Portal de Periódicos Capes/MEC, Scielo periodical library, PubMed and Science Direct. As results, the systematic review collected around 862 results for “fungi from the Amazon” adding up the portals searched, and no results for “teaching Mycology in the Amazon”. It was observed that Mycology as a discipline or as content within the Microbiology discipline, is offered in eight higher education institutions in face-to-face courses, three of which are public and five are private. Of these, only the three public institutions showed interest in participating in the teaching resource evaluation stage. The teachers were approached through the application of semi structured questionnaires, based on the Delphi method. The 1st round surveyed the profile of five teachers and the 2nd round served to evaluate the textbook prototype that is part of the educational product. The book resulting from this research is divided into five units that will cover: 1. The Fungi Kingdom; 2. Characterization of the phyla; 3. Amazonian biodiversity; 4. Resources for teaching Mycology. In the 1st round, the referees indicated the lack of specific resources for undergraduate teaching on Amazonian fungi and that they largely rely on published articles and research results from their master's and doctoral students. In the 2nd round, the reviewers' evaluation of the textbook proposal indicated good aesthetic and communicational presentation, adequacy of the proposed content, highlighting the potential of “bringing Amazonian students closer to regionally relevant content”. Some suggestions for improvement were the expansion of content on endophytic fungi and the inclusion of biological cycles of the phyla. Based on the evaluation carried out, the educational product was improved, associating the textbook with the fungosdaamazonia.my.canva.site/fungosdaamazonia website with a view to its future publication and adoption with part of the collection of references used by teachers in the area of Microbiology and Mycology. Each chapter has proposed activities to deepen the content and suggestions for classes in non-formal environments to allow undergraduates a more transdisciplinary view of Mycology. It is expected that this product can serve to contextualize Mycology taught in the Amazon in Biological Sciences Degree classes, aiming in the medium and long term, for a greater rapprochement between basic education students and knowledge about fungi, through the actions of future teachers.