Working on the Same Problem – Concepts; With the Usual Subjects – Prospective Elementary Teachers

Abstract

The purpose of current study was to shed light on what concepts or ideas prospective elementary teachers drew on (and how) when they reasoned about problems related to division of fractions. The participants were 153 senior prospective elementary teachers who registered for a mathematics-methods course either during the 2004-2005 or 2005- 2006 academic year. The participants were from a metropolitan city university located in the central part of Turkey. The study was based on an open-ended written assessment item administered during the very first class of the semester before any teaching. One of the applied open-ended questions was: “Write a real-world problem that would be solved or modeled by 4 3 2 1 2 ÷ .” A question like this requires a detailed analysis of the concepts of division and fractions as opposed to getting a single numeric result. Such a question, to some extent, provided an opportunity to investigate these teachers’ reasoning about division and fractions. The results showed that prospective elementary teachers had significant difficulties in thinking about fractions, division, and units.

Keywords

• Conceptual understanding,reasoning,division of fractions,prospective elementary teachers,assessment

Sorun Aynı - Kavramlar; Kitle Aynı - Öğretmen Adayları

Öz

Öğretmenlerin matematiksel kavramları anlamaları ve bunları kullanma becerileri birçok araştırmaya konu Olmuştur. Bu çalışma öğretmen adaylarına kesirlerde görüş bildirmek kavramsal anlamalar nelere, nasıl odaklandıklarını incelemektedir. 2004-2005 ve 2005-2006 akademik yılları Türkiye Orta Anadolu bir büyükşehir üniversitesinde sınıf öğretmenliğinde kayıtlı bulunulan 153 tane son sınıf, sınıf öğretmeni adayına dönemin başladığı ilk derslerde açık uçlu sorulardan oluşan bir sınav sınavı uygulanmış. Uygulamada sorulan bir yerde kesirlerde bölme işlemiyle ilgili olup " 4 3 2 1 2 ÷ işlemi ile modellenebilen (veya çözülebilen) sözel bir problem yazınız "biçimindedir. Bu soru, klasik anlamdaki işlem sonucuna yönelik sorulardan farklı ya da kesirler ve bölme kavramlarını analiz etmeyi talep ettiği için adayların bilgi ve nasıl akıl yürüttükleri ortaya çıkarılmış etkili olmuş. Yapilmis analizler, öğretmen adaylarının anlam bakımından kesirler, bölme ve birİŞler ilgili bir çok kavramda eksikliğinin ortaya çıkarmıştır.

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Kavramsal anlama, muhakeme, kesirlerde bölme, öğretmen adayları, değerlendirme

Kaynakça

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