Resumo:
This research, qualitative, aimed to understand the contributions of contextualization for mathematics learning in the rural school students. It was held at a rural school in the city of Maria da Fé, south of Minas Gerais, and sought to answer the question: What are the potentials and limits of formulating and solving contextualized problems for the mathematical learning of students in rural schools? The theoretical framework runs through Countryside Education, Mathematical Education and Situated Learning based on the approaches of Ethnomathematics and Critical Mathematics Education, Problem Resolution and Formulation and Social Learning Theory. The research is characterized as a field of research, whose pedagogical actions are approaching a critical approach to intervene in math teaching process through a partnership between the researcher and a teacher of the 5th year of a school field. The proposed activities were made up of dependent stages, that is, the result of one implied the development of the next. The data analyzed comes from audio and video recordings, the researcher's field diary and the students' productions. The analysis, based on Wenger's Social Theory of Learning and Lave's situated learning concept, was traversed by three axes: learning as belonging, learning as experience and learning how to do. The results found show how much the context can provide different means of mathematical learning, mainly the one connected with the perspective of the student's belonging. The adopted approach points out relationships that can be established between the school context and the student context, outside the school, providing a more effective participation of the student and the family, through the valorization of their mathematical knowledge. Regarding future perspectives, the research pointed out gaps in the initial and continuing education of teachers. These gaps require new critical research, capable of triggering a rethinking of educational practices for rural schools.
