"What's the @?" Creating Instagram profiles for math personalities

Abstract

This experience report aims to share the experiences of future teachers related to the development of a task proposed in the discipline of Introduction to the History of Mathematics, in the Mathematics degree course at the State University of Paraná, Paranavaí Campus. The provocation “What if mathematical personalities who lived between the 17th and 20th centuries had profiles on Instagram?” guided the proposition and development of the aforementioned task, whose objective was to enable future teachers to become familiar with the biography and study trajectory of some personalities who contributed to the development of European ethnomathematics. The task requested future teachers to simulate profiles on the social network Instagram for personalities such as Leonard Euler; Pierre de Fermat; Isaac Newton. During its execution, the task showed potential to promote reflections about relevant aspects related to the formative process of future teachers, such as: the (re)signification of the history of mathematics; the perception of the task as an alternative to written research proposals requested from Basic Education students; the mobilization/development of creativity; the humanization of the personalities, their studies, and the valuing of the social context in which they were inserted; the perception of social networks as potential tools for the teaching of mathematics. Thus, this proposal proved fruitful in promoting future teachers' interest in the History of Mathematics and making its study more dynamic.