Abstract:

In a society of knowledge, often controlled by economic factors where the amount and complexity of information grow dramatically, it is necessary that school, from the earliest years of schooling, provides contents, tools and resources that help the students to achieve a full citizenship. This project, supported by the potential of multimedia technologies, is addressed to students of the 1st cycle of basic education. In this context, the main objectives considered were the creation of interactive multimedia contents to provide a first contact with the mathematical concepts and the creation of a website to collect and share information, experiences and realities relevant to the development and validation of the project. Multimedia contents allow presenting mathematical concepts from its applicability in everyday life, based on stories related with economic, social and cultural reality of children. The history of mathematics is considered too, from stories that present not only a succession of facts, but fundamentally, that demonstrate a creative process, often triggered by the need to solve concrete problems. These concepts are supplemented with interactive games that allow supporting the perspective of the students in the learning process. The website allows students and teachers to share experiences, creativity and imagination based on real-life stories that demonstrate the application and importance of mathematics in everyday situations. In fact, this project allows promoting the use of new technologies as a support for motivating and efficient teaching and learning as it enables the use of Internet as a preferred method for establishing learning communities, information sharing and collaborative work and it demonstrates that Mathematics, traditionally associated with high levels of failure, is, however, a key area to help students identify, interpret, evaluate and criticize the nature of mathematical processes, implicit in several areas of activity. According to the cognitive development of children, learning through stories increases the interest and attention of children and develops imagination, creativity and expression of ideas. The use of interactive multimedia leads to greater adaptability to different learning styles and greater involvement of students in the learning process. Teachers have to adopt attitudes and methodologies to effectively transmit knowledge, motivating the student to learn more and succeeding to change student’s passive and detached attitude. The student must no longer consider mathematics difficult and insignificant in later life. The educator must be able to understand and explain the importance of mathematics, in spite of his own negative personal experience. The new technologies of information and communication are increasingly taking part on the daily lives of students, parents and teachers, as new forms of cultural learning. It can be demonstrated that the computer can be used in contexts of teaching and learning.

Keywords:

interactive multimedia, e-learning, mathematics.