Modeling using data available on the Internet

Abstract

The aim of this chapter is to reflect on the possibilities and implications of using data, information, or images available on the Internet in the teaching of mathematics, particularly in the development of modeling projects. This reflection will be developed based on an example of a modeling project generated by a group of secondary school students (12-13 years old) through the analysis of an animated image depicting the melting of a glacier over a period of 150 years. The animation was found online and the project was developed with the use of GeoGebra software, which was fundamental for the construction of numerical data. The studies of Borba (2009), addressing possible scenarios for the use of the Internet in the mathematics classroom, and of Diniz and Borba (2012), discussing the use of data available on the Internet by students to develop modeling projects, will form the basis for our reflections. Some aspects we intend to address are the following: the demand for problems and pedagogical approaches which are in harmony with the use of Internet; the possibilities offered by the use of software and its role in working with data from the Internet; the advantages of using the Internet to develop mathematical modeling projects.