Aprender a aprender y el papel de las competencias. Un análisis comparativo de los currículos y de los sistemas de instrucción obligatoria en América Latina

Over the past decade, there is a growing interest on the issue of “competences” and more specifically of “learning to learn” shown by both educational policies (Delors, 1996; Metas Educativas iberoamericanas 2021, 2008) and the recent researches in the international context (Kupiainen, Hautamäki, Rantanen, 2008; Deakin Crick, Stringher, Ren, 2014; Stringher, 2016).The purpose of this paper is to present a research work based on a quali-quantitative comparative analysis of national curricula currently in use in Latin America. The qualitative analysis was aimed to conduct a comparison of national curricula with respect to some variables considered significant for this purpose (the country, the presence of the curriculum, the presence of multiple curricula per level, any changes and updates to the curriculum carried out over the past 5 years). Moreover, the qualitative analysis was aimed to make a comparison among the different national curricula currently in use in Latin America, targeting on the presence both of “competence” and “learning to learn” constructs. Specifically, the qualitative analysis was aimed to investigate how "learn to learn" was asserted with special reference to its constituent components. The output of the qualitative analysis is the national curricula comparison obtained through a comparative table with the variables pointed out previously. The quantitative analysis is aimed at comparing the national curricula currently in use in Latin America through a computer-assisted textual analysis. The output of the quantitative analysis gives back an exploration of the deep structural meanings conveyed by the national curricula specifically on the topic “learning to learn”. First results on quali-quantitative analysis show that national curricula are not available in all countries of Latin America. Along a continuum, some structural, cultural and symbolic differences among the analyzed countries come to light. On one hand, some countries don’t have a curriculum or work with subjects (asignaturas) instead of “competence”. On the other hand, other countries consider “learn to learn” as a key-competences with a deep focus on its constituent components.