AN ANALYSIS OF THE IMPORTANCE OF MENTAL CALCULATION IN THE 5TH GRADE OF ELEMENTARY SCHOOL AT THE PEDRO LUDOVICO TEIXEIRA MUNICIPAL SCHOOL IN THE MUNICIPALITY OF COLINAS DO TOCANTINS

This text is part of a research project on how students should be encouraged to perform mental calculations. The main hypothesis is that when stimulated, it can become a habitual and simple skill to improve calculation abilities in various contexts. This article explores the application of activities that stimulate mental calculation in the 5th grade of elementary school. The objective is to demonstrate the effectiveness of mental calculation in elementary school, showing how students' autonomy and critical thinking can be developed, promoting the acquisition of a skill that will be useful in daily activities ranging from simple to highly complex, involving numbers and mathematics as a whole. Through research with a qualitative and quantitative approach, the results obtained with 15 students from a class chosen due to their difficulty in performing simple calculations are presented. Practical activities were carried out, divided into two groups, which helped to identify difficulties with mental calculation. The group with simpler activities had a high number of correct answers. The use of calculators was not encouraged in any of the activities, as the focus was on evaluating the students' level of mental calculation skills. The more complex activities showed a higher error rate, and only 37% of the students achieved an excellent grade, meaning they had more than 60% correct answers out of the total grade. Analyzing the grades and the activities applied, the class had an average level, as some propositions that were considered simple were not solved.