Construção do conceito imagem de limite por concluintes de Licenciatura em Matemática da UFPel

Abstract

This qualitative study aimed to investigate how graduating students of the Mathematics Licentiate program at the Federal University of Pelotas assimilate and express their understanding of the concept of limit. Motivated by the interest in understanding learning strategies based on the theories of Vygotsky and Tall, the research sought to answer the central question: “How, from the researcher's perspective, do graduating students of the Mathematics Teaching Degree at UFPEL characterize their understanding of the concept of limit?” The theoretical framework was based on the contributions of Vygotsky (2001), Domingos (2003), and David Tall (2013), which supported the discussion on the construction of mathematical knowledge and the development of formal thinking. In order to map the strategies used by students to solve tasks involving the concept of limit and classify them according to their mathematical thinking, four questions on limits were developed based on didactic literature and the Pedagogical Course Project. The study included the participation of seven students from both full-time and evening courses, excluding students from the Distance Education (EaD) modality. The results indicated that the understanding of the concept of limit varies between embodied and symbolic, focusing on processes and symbols but lacking the necessary abstract internalization for complete formalization. This gap between the image concept and the definition concept compromises students' ability to abstract and generalize, highlighting the importance of pedagogical methodologies that integrate intuition, symbolism, and formalism to foster a more robust mathematical development.