Procesos de generalización en la iniciación al álgebra escolar: reporte de una experiencia con estudiantes de grado octavo

Abstract

Various investigations, both national and international, in the field of Mathematics didactics, in particular related to school algebra, report difficulties for students to give meaning to the symbols and to recognize their operative nature. In this research, an instrument of inquiry was applied with 8th and 9th grade students (13-14 and 14-15 years old) whose results coincide with some of the difficulties reported in these investigations. These results are far from institutionally expected, that is grounded in curriculum math standards. Apparently, the difficulties are generated, among other reasons, by the way in which the curricular contents are approached in the classroom; in many occasions from a treatment that starts from the symbolic, with limited sources of meaning. A classroom experience with eighth grade students was developed based on the adaptation of a set of activities, favorable to the work of algebraic thinking, using sequences of figures, numerical sequences and situations in real contexts, prioritizing the construction of meaning for the symbols by means of the generalization of patterns, from different interpretations of "the letter" and making possible the identification of the operative character of the symbols. We report the results obtained by applying this set of activities and their influence on the teaching and learning process of school algebra.