A Constituição de um Fundo Documental e a Matemática no Curso Preparatório à Admissão ao Ginásio Pelotense

Abstract

This master’s research is linked to the Postgraduate Program in Mathematics Education (PPGEMAT) of the Federal University of Pelotas (UFPel) and had two objectives: first, it aimed to set up the Documentary Collection “Mathematics in Entrance Examinations to Ginásio Pelotense”, based on archives of the Museum of Colégio Municipal Pelotense, located in the city of Pelotas, Rio Grande do Sul, and contemplating the period between 1925 and 1971; second, it aimed to analyze the documents of the Collection to investigate how Mathematics was taught in the preparatory course for entrance exams to Ginásio Pelotense, referring to the decades of 1960 and 1970. The Collection included three categories, namely, administrative documents, pedagogical documents and mathematical documents. The Collection enabled some reflections on possible potentials for research in the history of education and the history of mathematical education. Regarding the analysis of the preparatory course, we identified traces of a school culture that prepared the students to take the entrance exams at the same time as they were getting used to the new study habits typical of secondary education, functioning not only as a space of improvement of the candidates but also as a first filter of access to the Ginásio. As for the mathematics of the preparatory course, we were able to identify that during the 1960s, mathematics contents were closely associated with the national prescriptions for entrance exams of 1959, and with the Programa Experimental para o Ensino Primário Gaúcho, published in the same year. Finally, the analysis also identified a significant change in the mathematics of the course in 1971, in which traces related to Modern Mathematics appear.