TED Community » Orlando Figueiredo

About Me

My name is Orlando Figueiredo I was born on 1967, May 21st and I teach physics and chemistry at a secondary school in the city of Peniche which is about 80 km north of Lisbon and is a very interesting city from the point of view of geology. Peniche is a peninsula, but 400 years ago it was an island. It has some nice carstic landscapes and a small archipelago. The city is also knew by the surfers as it has very good waves for surfing.
Has I've told I am 40 years old and I teach physics and chemistry at Peniche's secondary school (15 to 18 years old students).
I graduate (1992) in chemical engineering and worked for more than 4 years as Quality Control Supervisor in a pharmaceutical company. Soon I found that the industrial competitive world was killing me and my convictions. While I was finishing my graduation I had taught mathematics as a part-time job, so I decided go back to teaching. In 1997 I quit my job at the industry and started to teach physics and chemistry has a substitute teacher. In 99 I become a full-time teacher and in 2002 I finished my post-graduation in pedagogy. This is a request in Portugal has I didn't have a graduation in teaching and learning but in engineering. I have worked with students from two levels of teaching: 3rd cycle (12 to 15) and secondary (15 to 18).
My passion for the nature remotes to my childhood. I was very close to animals and, although I was raised in the Lisbon suburbs, I had the chance of spending the long summer vacations in a small village in the north of Portugal. It is a beautiful region in the country side, by the see. Much of my contact with the "wild" was done there.
In March 2006 I finished my master degree in Education (Science Education). My dissertation work intended to establish relationships between teacher's conceptions about science and about education for sustainability and their reflection on teaching practices. It took me two years to finish the work. I used a case study methodology and interviewed several science teachers (geology, biology, physics and chemistry). But the dissertation was written using only the data from two teachers that gave me the opportunity to be present, during three months, in their classrooms. Right now I'm working on my PhD concerning science education, environmental education and education for sustainability.
In my theoretical framework I position myself in the Deep Ecology movement, Gaia theroy and on holistic and systemic views of the world.
I practice meditation (within the kagyu tradition of the vajrahyana buddhism), and I am finishing in July 2008 a three years course on the buddhist philosophical tradition. I found a lot of exciting connections in the buddhist view of the world and the deep ecology approach. I have published some articles on that issue but, unfortunately, they are all in Portuguese.
Though I don't have much, in my free time I like to walk in the nature with my dogs. Although I think that I am not very good at it I also like photography.