Proposals by Tito Cardoso de Oliveira regarding the teaching of decimal metric system in Pará, Brazil

In this paper, we present the results of an investigation of Arithmetic textbooks written in the late 19th and early 20th centuries containing the topic “decimal metric system”. Among the textbooks published in the State of Pará, Brazil, we highlight the work of Tito Cardoso de Oliveira: “Arithmetica Complementar para os cursos primário complementar, normal e commercial”. We present a description and an analysis of the decimal metric system topic present in the 8th edition of his textbook, which was probably published in the 1920s. The proposals metric system's teaching and learning have reflections on classroom practices. We verify that the determinations established by the legislation are partially followed by Oliveira. He presents the metric system clearly and objectively, includes several illustrations and contextualized arithmetic problems related to this topic. However, he does not include other principles of the intuitive method, propagated since the last decade of the nineteenth century in Brazil and prescribed by school legislation