Abstract:

Today's world presents us with a scenario of uncertainty and constant change. Schools and education face the crucial challenge of adjusting to current needs and preparing children and young people for the challenges of an uncertain future. In this context, education must be able to reinvent itself, adapting to the present reality and offering solid foundations for training and preparation for the future. Clearly, teaching based on memorization practices and exercise resolution using formulas in a mechanical way, designed by the teacher in order to exercise exposed knowledge, does not meet the needs of today's world and increasingly belongs to the past. Today's challenges require teaching and learning processes that connect to everyday life and promote an integrated development of knowledge, skills, and attitudes to prepare students to be the thinkers and entrepreneurs of the future. There is a growing need for an education that promotes the development of foundations that foster continued learning throughout life: knowing how to communicate, collaborate, think critically, be creative, practice self-regulation, value the role of knowledge, and develop attitudes of self-confidence, perseverance, autonomy, and initiative in one's own abilities. In particular, in the field of mathematics, along with the knowledge to be acquired, it is essential to work on transversal mathematical skills such as problem solving, mathematical reasoning, mathematical communication, different mathematical representations and mathematical connections (internal and external), as well as computational thinking. The teacher is therefore faced with the need to reinvent his or her teaching strategies to reach the world of the pupil, who needs to perceive learning as useful and stimulating. A student who is motivated, attentive and involved in the tasks proposed by the teacher has a natural predisposition for learning. Thus, placing the student in the role of problem solver, in learning contexts that are relevant to him, that he can easily understand and that are simultaneously challenging is a good way to meaningful learning in an integrated way.

Following these ideas, we propose a didactic sequence for the 4th grade of elementary school, which allows establishing relationships between fractions, decimals, and percentages, in the context of problem solving. Starting from a real-life situation - the making of a giant Christmas cake in the town where the students live, to be distributed to the population - the students are invited to reflect on and analyse various situations related to the planning of the initiative, using the mathematical skills that are intended to be worked on at this level of education. Various extensions are possible addressing internal connections in mathematics content, as well as connections of mathematics with other areas of knowledge.

Keywords:

Mathematics teaching and learning, didactic sequence, problem solving, fractions, decimals and percentages.