Inventive moments to mobilise sinusoidal functions

This paper presents ways of animating the concept of function at primary school, through the aid of a motion detector that works with bi-dimensional motion. The technological environment favours a graphical approach to function, engaging the children in bodily activities. Starting from the new materialist perspective offered by de Freitas and Sinclair, we want to discuss ways of moving, doing and knowing in the classroom as pedagogical possibilities of in(ter)vention and inventiveness to mobilise the mathematical concepts at play. Particular focus will be on the instance of sinusoidal functions and their relative properties through reference to circular motion.