Analogies and Analogue Thinking in Teaching Learning Interdisciplinary Mathematical Models

Reasoning by analogies involves identifying a system of common relations between two situations and generating additional deductions based on coincidences. These coincidences can also include similarities of concrete properties between the situations being analysed, contributing to infer associations or mental constructions of learning through relational thinking. This paper outlines the proposal to teach the topic Ordinary Differential Equations (ODEs) with Constant Coefficients (CC) through the analysis of basic engineering models with a view to find the analogies that lie in the systems presented. The aim is to identify and compare variables in equations in their symbolic, numerical and graphical aspects. Although this may seem a very complex process, it is evident that the strategy of teaching a topic by analogies allows to promote competency-based teaching.