Digimatic Narratives in Sandbox Game: mapping sociotechnical networks and controversies in the production of a school digital replica

Abstract

In the present study, we describe the tensions that permeated the production of Mathematics narratives carried out by children in association with the open-world Minecraft and its elements for the construction of a digital replica of a municipal public school in the city of Salvador. We used secondary data produced during a university extension workshop in 2018 in a municipal public school with students in the fifth year of Elementary School. We anchor this investigation in the theoretical and methodological contributions of the Actor-Network Theory, operationalized by the Cartography of Controversies. The results indicate that the narratives that are called digimatics are the product of a socio-technical network, fed by agencies that tension the relationships and processes of teaching and learning Mathematics, causing shifts and transformations in the actors involved. The Minecraft open world acted as a mediator in the appropriation of mathematical concepts, and the tensions and controversies that emerged from the Digimatic Narratives, during the construction of the replicas, came from an exhaustive process of negotiations, disputes, and arrangements between children and Minecraft.

Digimatic Narratives; Socio-technical network; Minecraft; Actor-Network Theory; Mathematics