A historical study about methods for solving differential equations: separable method linear method
Differential Equations. Historical investigation. History of Mathematics. Teaching of Differential Equations. Historical problems
This doctoral work addresses the development of methods for solving Differential Equations proposed by Gottfried Wilhelm Von Leibniz (1646 –1716), Christiaan Huygens (1629-1695), Jakob Bernoulli (1655-1705), and Johann Bernoulli (1667-1748), through the correspondence exchanged by these scholars and/or in their publications in the Acta Eruditorum in the last decade of the 17th century. The aim is to analyze the problems that led to the construction of models and solutions for Differential Equations, as a mathematical knowledge in the field of Differential Calculus, in order to identify and explain their conceptual and didactic potential for teaching this subject in today's Mathematics courses. In this path, we point out the scholars responsible for such studies in the examined historical period, along with their respective issues. For this purpose, we employ the methodological resource of content analysis proposed by Bardin (2016) to analyze the information from primary sources explored throughout the text, in addition to providing comments on the historical context of the 17th century. We conclude with some suggestions and approaches that can be explored in the classroom during the Differential Equations course (or related topics) or in History of Mathematics. We believe that this research can contribute to the teaching of ordinary Differential Equations concerning the investigative work of the theme.