Two weights and two measures: a proposal to discuss the nature of the measure units system in classroom

Abstract

This article suggests a plan of classroom teaching that discusses the nature of the Measure Units Systems, involving an interdisciplinary work. Through dynamic of groups, reading and interpretation of historical texts,poems, illustrations, and other sources, we believe it is possible to show that the measure units system adopted today (SI) is not a given data, but rather the result of a historical process of negotiation of meanings, and therefore dependent upon social relations. From the perspective of the Social Studies of Science (also known as New History and Sociology of Knowledge) the authors present some discussions involved in the adoption of the Decimal System in France, and the difficulties of its subsequent implementation in Brazil, expressed by the Quebra-Quilos Rebellion. The authors hope that the suggestions presented in this paper allow the students to recognize themselves as participants in the construction of scientific knowledge, through observing in daily life the changes that add new features to it, as well as trying to make more significant a topic of the curriculum which is often considered uninteresting, boring , of mere memorization of units and their conversions.