Proposals for Teacher Training in the Face of the Challenge of Educating for Sustainable Development: Beyond Epistemologies and Methodologies

Abstract

The predominant educational matrix based on unconstrained progress, individualism and competition needs to be reinvented so that it can contribute effectively to sustainable development. In this sense, the role of higher education institutions as trainers of local and global leaders is considered fundamental, along with the role of university teachers who are mediators of learning and great influencers. Thus, this article intends to reflect the ontological dimension on the programs of teacher training higher education, in view of the need to review mental models regarding actions aimed at effective sustainable development. Based on a foundation and a set of reflections, the importance of adding ontological aspects to teacher trainings, as well as the intellectual and methodological aspects, in which the following elements emerge: methodological congruence; multidimensionality of being; multidimensionality of relationships; attention to the unveiling of ‘power from within’; meaningful learning; solidarity and civic culture; learning spaces; access to truths; heterogeneous plural practices (transdisciplinarity); wisdom and imagination; acting in teams; collective intelligence; group dynamics; world of youth; designer of learning environments.