LEARNING RHYTHMIZED BY CHILDREN: Drumming at Olho do Tempo Living School in João Pessoa, Paraíba, Brazil

Abstract

This study analyses the relationships of childhood learning in the educational context of
the Olho do Tempo Living School, a civil society organization of public interest located in a rural area of
João Pessoa in the Brazilian state of Paraíba, where children engage in the practice of drumming as a
pedagogical proposal. We weave together interdisciplinary theories on early childhood learning and
learning through practice. From a patchwork based on participant observation of the children’s actions
and perceptions, we address the following categories that both were felt and emerged in the fieldwork:
participation, autonomy, development and growth in/with the body. We conclude that the actions
understood by the children as “learning on one’s own” and “holding one’s own” are entangled with
conflicting ties (re)born in intra- and intergenerational relations and in relations with things (mainly the
instruments) in the environment. It is through these relations that the children deconstruct the adultcentric interpretation of the teaching-learning relationship.