MALE TEACHER IN EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION: DOES SEXUAL ORIENTATION INFLUENCE TEACHING WORK?

This research aimed to find out what male teachers say about their professional work with children in early childhood education, showing whether teachers' sexual orientation can influence teaching work. The methodology used was of a qualitative nature of the descriptive type, with the recording of interviews, through the Google Meet platform, with three teachers who work in early childhood education in different municipalities of Mato Grosso do Sul. The results obtained show that: there are prejudices inherent to gender and sexuality relations in early childhood education, which influence the role of male teachers; homosexual teachers face greater difficulties than heterosexual ones and, although their image is wrongly associated with femininity, these subjects face more prejudice in the relational aspect with adults, including family members, teachers, school management, etc.; children do not show any objections regarding the gender or sexual orientation of male teachers. We conclude that early childhood education should be a space where male teachers can and should act, regardless of their sexual orientation, since the most important thing is the training of these professionals and the ability to work with young children.