The project work in mathematics: Questioning the reality in a 3rd grade classroom

Abstract

The present article is focused on the analysis of the relation between project work and the social use of Mathematics. It presents a part of a study framed on the critical perspective of Mathematics Education, which aimed to contribute to a further understanding about the nature of project work, its assumptions and to analyze the mathematical skills and democratic competences that are improved while working in an integrated way. In this research we adopted a qualitative methodology in which was privileged the data collection technique of participant observation. We discuss how a group of four students of the 3rd grade has developed their mathemacy sense, during lessons in which they have made a project to find out which power supplier company would be more economical. The results suggest a development of a critical competence on the students in the understanding of the social use of Mathematics, powered by the project work as the knowledge in use has emerged in close connection with the sociopolitical context of the students. This competency appears to come, mostly, from the mathematics knowledge that was mobilized through the reality questioning, while exercising their citizenship.