Presence of the gender equality principle in the Teaching Guides of the Primary Education Degree in Spain

Abstract

The principle of gender equality is an element enshrined in Spanish legislation. Thus, its development in the different educational curricula should be considered as an obligation, turning university education into a channel for the consolidation of ways of change and social improvement. In this regard, the teaching guide constitutes a fundamental genre for the visibilization of this principle in the teaching programs. Within this framework, the study aims to analyze the presence of the principle of equality in the teaching guides of specific didactic subjects in the Primary Education Degree of the Spanish University Network. From a qualitative approach, a corpus of 794 teaching guides obtained from 65 universities offering the Primary Education Degree during the 2020-2021 academic year was analyzed. Among the main results, the scarce presence of the principle of gender equality in the corpus as a whole stands out, with the area of Social Sciences being the most permeable to its inclusion. In addition, it is worth noting the technical-didactic inconsistency of those teaching guides that include gender equality precepts in some sections: it is evident that gender precepts do not materialize in learning outcomes, contents or evaluation indicators. In addition, there is a limitation of contents and learning outcomes linked to conceptual and procedural learning. In conclusion, the situation of the academic degree analyzed demands an activation of the recognition of the figure of women through the principle of gender equality, in order to continue working on the eradication of inequalities between men and women and thus favor the transformation of teaching practices in favor of inclusive social models.