Local Geographies as a source for the mobilization of spatial reasoning processes in the early Years of Elementary School

Abstract

Starting from a search movement for pedagogical practices relevant to the students’ realities, the present work intends to reflect on the possibilities of mobilizing different modes and processes of spatial reasoning from the problematization of local spatialities within the scope of the initial years of Elementary School, aiming at explore students’ geographical and cartographic learning. For this, the main results of a research linked to a university extension project that sought to evaluate the pertinence of the use of a set of didactic-cartographic materials developed for this stage of schooling are presented. The case study took place in a school in the rural area of the Municipality of Irati, State of Paraná, Brazil, involving the use of cartographic representations, designated as Image-Maps, of the surroundings of the school, and made based on satellite images, mobilizing different modes and processes of spatial reasoning. It was concluded that the materials and didactic process studied tend to enhance the learning of concepts and processes of spatial reasoning, in addition to promoting a critical attitude on the part of students in face of their everyday spatiality. In addition, it was found that the focus of the work methodology, oriented to thinking and notions of a generalizing and conceptual order, did not remove students from
their immediate context of experience, demonstrating a clear potential for the promotion of new and broad possibilities of reading about the geographies of their community and the world around them.