Software Desmos como ferramenta de ensino e aprendizagem de derivadas

Abstract

The research present, of predominantly qualitative nature, is exploratory and had as of target audience of students 15 of the discipline of Calculus I, of the Agronomy course, of a public teaching institution of RS. The purpose of this work was to develop and apply a Learning Unit for the teaching of variations of functions through the concept of derivatives, with the help of Desmos software, with the aim of answering our research question: What are the contributions of Desmos software to Learning of variations of functions related to the concept of derivatives? The present question arose through the observation of the class in which a pedagogical intervention proposed by a Master's discipline would be developed. Through this observation it was possible to diagnose some difficulties of the students regarding the understanding of the functions, their graphs and the concept of derivatives, as well as to notice that the class was quite heterogeneous and introverted. Facing these difficulties, we set out to construct and apply an Apprenticeship Unit that contemplated exploratory activities of construction of function graphs with the Desmos software, and analysis of the behavior of the function and its first and second order derivatives, with the objective of promoting student learning and encouraging their participation and autonomy during class. In general, the contributions to learning took place in the aspect of visualization, analysis and comparison, which gave the students a discovery environment, making teaching more dynamic and interesting.