Life trajectories and Supervision – Three perspectives

Abstract

As a dynamic construct, the concept of Supervision has been reconfigured in recent decades. Taking into account the personal and professional experiences in the life trajectories, three views reveal individual contributions to the shared construction of the supervisory concept and related action. Isabel Alarcão tells, in an autobiographical-type narrative, how her interest in the theme emerged and how she felt the need to configure the concept. She explains the factors that influenced her to extend the field of supervision to continuing education, professional development and institutional supervision, in addition to initial teacher education. Through her narrative, we come to know the questions that have been raised, the processes, difficulties, advances and pauses in the development of theories and practices of supervision. Idália Sá‑Chaves recognizes herself as a researcher, teacher, person, disciple of Isabel Alarcão and in her narrative, sequential to the previous one, presents the contributions of the perspectives of modeling the complexity for the understanding of supervisory thinking and acting as the possibility of deepening the view on education / supervision in its entirety, multidimensionality and contextual variability. Maria do Céu Roldão, initially oriented towards initial teacher education, in line with the perspectives of Alarcão and Sá-Chaves, subsequently developed her line of reflection and action in supervision as an instrument for the production of professional knowledge, in the continuum of professional development. Her narrative focuses on the reframing of the concept based on teaching professionality. The three narratives, sequential and coherent in their rational and designs, add details that characterize the singularities of individual perspectives as a result of personal experiences.