• Research in Mathematical Education
• /
• v.26 no.4
• /
• pp.271-289
• /
• 2023

This research investigates the development of elementary students' concepts of line segments, straight lines, and rays, employing metaphor analysis as a research methodology. By analyzing metaphorical expressions, the research aims to explore how elementary students form these geometric concepts line segments, straight lines, and lays and evolve their understanding of them across different grades. Surveys were conducted with elementary school students in grades three to six, focusing on metaphorical expressions and corresponding their reasons associated with line segments, straight lines, and rays. The data were analyzed through coding and categorization to identify the types in students' metaphorical expressions. The analysis of metaphorical expressions identified five types: straightness, infinity or direction, connections of another geometric concepts, shape and symbols, and terminology.

• Journal of Educational Research in Mathematics
• /
• v.11 no.2
• /
• pp.239-256
• /
• 2001

The notion of metaphor has been increasingly popular in research of mathematics education. In particular, metaphor becomes a useful unit for analysis to provide a profound insight into mathematical reasoning and problem solving. In this context, this paper takes metaphor as an analytic unit to examine the relationship between objectivity and subjectivity in mathematical reasoning. Specifically, the discourse analysis focuses on the code switching between literal language and metaphor in mathematical discourse. It is shown that the linguistic code switching is parallel with the switching between two different kinds of mathematical knowledge, that is, factual knowledge and mathematical imagination, which constitute objectivity and subjectivity in mathematical reasoning. Furthermore, the pattern of the linguistic code switching reveals the dialectical relationship between the two poles of mathematical reasoning. Based on the understanding of the dialectical relationship, this paper provides some educational implications. First, the code-switching highlights diverse aspects of mathematics learning. Learning mathematics is concerned with developing not only technicality but also mathematical creativity. Second, the dialectical relationship between objectivity and subjectivity suggests that teaching and teaming mathematics is socioculturally constructed. Indeed, it is shown that not all metaphors are mathematically appropriated. They should be consistent with the cultural model of a mathematical concept under discussion. In general, this sociocultural perspective on mathematical metaphor highlights the sociocultural organization of teaching and loaming mathematics and provides a theoretical viewpoint to understand epistemological diversities in mathematics classroom.

• The Mathematical Education
• /
• v.62 no.1
• /
• pp.79-93
• /
• 2023

This study used metaphors as a analysis tool to investigate elementary school students' formation and development of angle concepts. For this purpose, the students were asked to write words associated with angle, right angle, acute angle and obtuse angle and to explain why. In case of angle and right angle, responses of 268 students from 3rd to 6th graders were analyzed and for acute angle and obtuse angle, those of 192 students from 4th to 6th graders were examined. As the results of categorizing the metaphors, they can be classified into categories such as; (1) qualitative aspects: 'things metaphor', 'personality metaphor', 'emotions metaphor' etc., (2) quantitative aspects: 'motions metaphor', 'changes metaphor', 'emotions metaphor' etc., and (3) relational aspects: 'shape relations metaphor.' The metaphoric expressions were prominent in 'qualitative aspects' associated with shapes. As for the other aspects, 'quantitative aspect'- the size of angles and the amount of spread and 'relational aspects' - elements of angle and relationship with another shapes, the frequency increses were shown to as grade levels were up. In case of right angle and acute angle, 'qualitative aspects' associated with shapes were outstanding and the frequency of the metaphoric expressions of obtuse angle was distributed similarly in three aspects. As the figure strand and the measurement strand are integrated to an strand in the 2022 revised curriculum, we need more discussion of multifaced aspects of angle and the learning sequences in the 'figure and measurement' strand.

• School Mathematics
• /
• v.5 no.1
• /
• pp.135-149
• /
• 2003

We present an understanding about students' conceptual model of differential equations, based on the discourse data that were collected in a differential equations course at a university in Korea. An interpretive approach is taken to analyze classroom discourse. This paper consists of three main parts. First, we completely analyze the students' use of conceptual metaphor in a university differential equations class. Secondly, we identify conceptual metaphors representing students' conceptual model of differential equations. Finally, we describe the mathematical characteristics of the conceptual metaphors identified in detail. Among other things, this paper reveals that there exists dual aspects of the students' conceptual model of differential equations. In other words, in the differential equations course observed we found that the students very often used two kinds of conceptual metaphor,“machine metaphor”and“fictive motion metaphor”, that have contrastingly different mathematical characteristics. In order to interpret the duality, we take a sociocultural perspective, and this perspective suggests and helps us to realize the significance of understanding of cognitive diversity in mathematics classroom.

• Education of Primary School Mathematics
• /
• v.25 no.4
• /
• pp.395-410
• /
• 2022

Nominalization is one of the grammatical metaphors, and it is the representation of verbal meaning through noun equivalent phrases. In mathematical word problems, texts using nominalization have both the advantage of clarifying the object to be noted in the mathematization stage, and the disadvantage of complicating sentence structure, making it difficult to understand the sentences and hindering the experience of the full steps in mathematical modelling. The purpose of this study is to analyze word problems in the textbooks from the perspective of nominalization, a linguistic element, and to derive implications in relation to students' difficulties during solving the word problems. To this end, the types of nominalization of 341 word problems from the content domain of 'Numbers and Operations' of elementary math textbooks according to the 2015 revised national curriculum were analyzed in four aspects: grade-band group, main class and unit assessment, specialized class, and mathematical expression required word problems. Based on the analysis results, didactical implications related to the linguistic expression of the mathematical word problems were derived.

• Education of Primary School Mathematics
• /
• v.26 no.2
• /
• pp.83-97
• /
• 2023

Nominalization is one of the grammatical metaphors that makes it easier to mathematize the target that needs to be converted into a formula, but it has the disadvantage of making problem understanding difficult due to complex and compressed sentence structures. To investigate how this nominalization affects students' problem-solving processes, an analysis was conducted on 233 third-grade elementary school students' problem solving of eight arithmetic word problems with or without nominalization. The analysis showed that the presence or absence of nominalization did not have a significant impact on their problem understanding and their ability to convert sentences to formulas. Although the students did not have any prior experience in nominalization, they restructured the sentences by using nominalization or agnation in the problem understanding stage. When the types of nominalization change, the rate of setting the formula correctly appeared high. Through this, the use of nominalization can be a pedagogical strategy for solving word problems and can be expected to help facilitate deeper understanding.