Pedro Puig Adam y la enseñanza de la matemática en el bachillerato en España (1926-1960)

Abstract

This work arises from the interest in the study of the proposals for the teaching of mathematics that Pedro Puig Adam, the Spanish high school professor of mathematics with the greatest international projection, directed to secondary education during his professional life (1926-1960). In order to understand these proposals, it is necessary to pay attention to the context in which they were developed, and to the organisation of secondary education in the period under consideration. The aim of this thesis is to place Pedro Puig Adam's proposals on the teaching of mathematics within the social and institutional context in which they were developed, and to study his influences and the repercussions of his work. In order to study the figure of Puig Adam, around whom this work revolves, as well as his contributions to the teaching of mathematics, the methodological contributions related to life histories have been considered. The methodology of life histories allows us to understand the professional trajectory of relevant teachers of a specific discipline, in this case Mathematics, who have developed their activity in a specific historical period. To this end, we have studied works published by Puig Adam that deal with autobiographical aspects of the performance of his profession, as well as others that cover methodological and didactic questions about the subject he taught. We have also considered works on the context in which his proposals were developed, as well as the influences or renovating experiences with which he was in contact, such as the Instituto-Escuela in Madrid and the Institut-Escola in Barcelona. Also, we have examined the writings and works of people who knew him, which provide, among other aspects, descriptions of activities in which Puig Adam took an active part. Another source for this work has been the textbooks that Puig Adam wrote, together with Julio Rey Pastor, for the subject of mathematics in the first years of secondary education. Their paratexts have been analysed, following the categories established by Genette, and one of the arithmetic topics for the first years (the square root) has been studied. For the analysis of the latter, we have used the tools provided by the Anthropological Theory of Didactics (ATD) for the study of the Didactics of Mathematics. The research results show that Puig Adam's proposals for the teaching of mathematics are rooted in the Escuela Nueva movement, and share similarities with the ILE programme and, more specifically, with the Instituto-Escuela. Puig Adam reflected on and explored these practices in depth, and was able to develop proposals on the teaching of mathematics at the secondary level that generated national and international interest, such as the heuristic method.