Dificuldades encontradas no ensino de matemática

Abstract

Mathematics is present in children's lives and, therefore, learning it enables them to know the world around them. Learning this subject is fundamental in Basic Education, however, the difficulties in mastering the contents still persist. In view of this, the aim of this study is to analyze the difficulties encountered in teaching mathematics in elementary school that have been identified and published. For the development of the study, the qualitative method was adopted and the methodological procedure for data collection was a bibliographical research. The results of the study demonstrate that students have difficulties in mastering the four fundamental functions: addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. These difficulties may persist throughout Basic Education and practical school for learning this subject at other levels of education. The study points out that one of the factors that generate a difficulty in learning mathematics are: counting errors, not mastering the algorithm, not being able to keep numerical data in working memory, not having conceptual knowledge of counting and not understanding the positional value digits, without decimal numbering system. As a strategy for solving the problem, this study points out that several methods can be adopted in the classroom to contribute to overcoming these difficulties, mainly focusing on teaching that prioritizes understanding the meaning of the four operations and their rules and not only the application of the algorithm.