• Research in Mathematical Education
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.157-173
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• 2024

Researchers continue to emphasize the centrality of proof in the context of school mathematics and the importance of proof to student learning of mathematics is well articulated in nationwide curricula. However, researchers reported that students' performance in proving tasks is not promising and students are not likely to see the need to prove a proposition even if they learned mathematical proof previously. Research attributes this issue to students' tendencies to accept an empirical argument as proof for a mathematical proposition, thus not being able to recognize the limitation of an empirical argument as proof for a mathematical proposition. In Korea, there is little research that investigated high school students' views about the need for proof in mathematics and their understanding of the limitation of an empirical argument as proof for a mathematical generalization. Sixty-two 11^th graders were invited to participate in an online survey and the responses were recorded in writing and on either a four- or five-point Likert scale. The students were asked to express their agreement with the need of proof in school mathematics and to evaluate a set of mathematical arguments as to whether the given arguments were proofs. Results indicate that a slight majority of students were able to identify a proof amongst the given arguments with the vast majority of students acknowledging the need for proof in mathematics.

• Journal of Educational Research in Mathematics
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.385-402
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• 2001

The purpose of this study is to conceptualize 'proof' school mathematics. We based on the assumption the following. (a) There are several different roles of 'proof' : verification, explanation, systematization, discovery, communication (b) Accepted criteria for the validity and rigor of a mathematical 'proof' is decided by negotiation of school mathematics community. (c) There are dynamic relations between mathematical proof and empirical theory. We need to rethink the nature of mathematical proof and give appropriate consideration to the different types of proof related to the cognitive development of the notion of proof. 'proof' in school mathematics should be conceptualized in the broader, psychological sense of justification rather than in the narrow sense of deductive, formal proof 'proof' has not been taught in elementary mathematics, traditionally, Most students have had little exposure to the ideas of proof before the geometry. However, 'proof' cannot simply be taught in a single unit. Rather, proof must be a consistent part of students' mathematical experience in all grades, in all mathematics.

• Communications of Mathematical Education
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.471-487
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• 2008

Inventive mathematical thinking, original mathematical problem solving ability, mathematical invention and so on are core concepts, which must be emphasized in all branches of mathematical education. In particular, Polya(1981) insisted that inventive thinking must be emphasized in a suitable level of university mathematical courses. In this paper, the author considered two cases of inventive problem solving ability shown by his many students via real analysis courses. The first case is about the proof of the problem "what is the derived set of the integers Z?" Nearly all books on mathematical analysis sent the question without the proof but some books said that the answer is "empty". Only one book written by Noh, Y. S.(2006) showed the proof by using the definition of accumulation points. But the proof process has some mistakes. But our student Kang, D. S. showed the perfect proof by using The Completeness Axiom, which is very useful in mathematical analysis. The second case is to show the infinite countability of NxN, which is shown by informal proof in many mathematical analysis books with formal proofs. Some students who argued the informal proof as an unreasonable proof were asked to join with us in finding the one-to-one correspondences between NxN and N. Many students worked hard and find two singled-valued mappings and one set-valued mapping covering eight diagrams in the paper. The problems are not easy and the proofs are a little complicated. All the proofs shown in this paper are original and right, so the proofs are deserving of inventive mathematical thoughts, original mathematical problem solving abilities and mathematical inventions. From the inventive proofs of his students, the author confirmed that any students can develope their mathematical abilities by their professors' encouragements.

• The Mathematical Education
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• v.43 no.4
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• pp.381-390
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• 2004

In this study, we conceptualized the ‘preformal proof’, which is a transitive level of proof from the experimental and inductive justification to the formalized mathematical proof. We investigated concrete features of the preformal proof in the historico-genetic and the didactical situations. The preformal proof can get the generality of the contents of proof, which makes a distinction from the experimental proof. And we can draw a distinction between the preformal and formal proof, in point that the preformal proof heads for the reality-oriented objects and does not use the formal language.

• Research in Mathematical Education
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.255-278
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• 2021

Proof serves a critical role in mathematical practices as well as in fostering student's mathematical understanding. However, the research literature accumulates results that there are not many opportunities available for students to engage with proving-related activities and that students' understanding about proof is not promising. This unpromising state of instruction of proof calls for a novel approach to address the aforementioned issues. This study investigated an instruction of proof to explore a pedagogy to teach how to prove. The teacher utilized the way of problem posing to make proving a routine part of everyday lesson and changed the classroom culture to support student proving. The study identified the teacher's support for student proving, the key pedagogical changes that embraced proving as part of everyday lesson, and what changes the teacher made to cultivate the classroom culture to be better suited for establishing a supportive community for student proving. The results indicate that problem posing has a potential to embrace proof into everyday lesson.

• Education of Primary School Mathematics
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.63-73
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• 2000

The purpose of this paper is to address He possibility of the teaching of 'proof' in elementary mathematics, on the assumption that proof in school mathematics should be used in the broader, psychological sense of justification rather than in the narrow sense of deductive, formal proof. 'Proof' has not been taught in elementary mathematics, traditionally. Most students have had little exposure to the ideas of proof before the geometry. However, 'Proof' cannot simply be taught in a single unit. Rather, proof must be a consistent part of students' mathematical experience in all grades. Or educators and mathematicians need to rethink the nature of mathematical proof and give appropriate consideration to the different types of proof related to the cognitive development of a notion of proof.

• The Mathematical Education
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• v.63 no.2
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• pp.139-163
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• 2024

The purpose of this study is to examine the capabilities of ChatGPT as a tool for supporting students in generating mathematical arguments that can be considered proofs. To examine this, we engaged students enrolled in a mathematics pathways course in evaluating and revising their original arguments using ChatGPT feedback. Students attempted to find and prove a method for the area of a triangle given its side lengths. Instead of directly asking students to prove a formula, we asked them to explore a method to find the area of a triangle given the lengths of its sides and justify why their methods work. Students completed these ChatGPT-embedded proving activities as class homework. To investigate the capabilities of ChatGPT as a proof tutor, we used these student homework responses as data for this study. We analyzed and compared original and revised arguments students constructed with and without ChatGPT assistance. We also analyzed student-written responses about their perspectives on mathematical proof and proving and their thoughts on using ChatGPT as a proof assistant. Our analysis shows that our participants' approaches to constructing, evaluating, and revising their arguments aligned with their perspectives on proof and proving. They saw ChatGPT's evaluations of their arguments as similar to how they usually evaluate arguments of themselves and others. Mostly, they agreed with ChatGPT's suggestions to make their original arguments more proof-like. They, therefore, revised their original arguments following ChatGPT's suggestions, focusing on improving clarity, providing additional justifications, and showing the generality of their arguments. Further investigation is needed to explore how ChatGPT can be effectively used as a tool in teaching and learning mathematical proof and proof-writing.

• Research in Mathematical Education
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.65-89
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• 2022

Despite its recognition in the field of mathematics education and mathematics, students' understanding about proof and performance on proof tasks have been far from promising. Research has documented that teachers tend to accept empirical arguments as proofs. In this study, an online survey was administered to examine how Korean secondary mathematic teachers make judgements on mathematical arguments varied along representations. The results indicate that, when asked to judge how convincing to their students the given arguments would be, the teachers tended to consider how likely students understand the given arguments and this surfaces as a controversial matter with the algebraic argument being both most and least convincing for their students. The teachers' judgements on the algebraic argument were shown to have statistically significant difference with respect to convincingness to them, convincingness to their students, and validity as mathematical proof.

• Education of Primary School Mathematics
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.85-99
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• 2003

In this paper, firstly examined various proofs types that cover informal empirical justifications by Balacheff, Miyazaki, and Harel ＆ Sowder and Tall. Using these theoretical frameworks, justification activities by 5th graders were analyzed and several conclusions were drawn as follow: 1) Children in 5th grade could justify using various proofs types and method ranged from external proofs schemes by Harel & Sowder to thought experiment by Balacheff This implies that children in elementary school can justify various mathematical statements of ideas for themselves. To improve children's proving abilities, rich experience for justifying should be provided. 2) Activities that make conjectures from cases then justify should be given to students in order to develop a sense of necessity of formal proof. 3) Children have to understand the meaning and usage of mathematical symbol to advance to formal deductive proofs. 4) New theoretical framework is needed to be established to provide a framework for research on elementary school children's justification activities. Research on proof mainly focused on the type of proof in terms of reasoning and activities involved. But proof types are also influenced by the tasks given. In elementary school, tasks that require physical activities or examples are provided. To develop students'various proof types, tasks that require various justification methods should be provided. 5) Children's justification type were influenced not only by development level but also by the concept they had. 6) Justification activities provide useful situation that assess students'mathematical understanding. 7) Teachers understanding toward role of proof(verification, explanation, communication, discovery, systematization) should be the starting point of proof activities.

• The Mathematical Education
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• v.41 no.1
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• pp.79-90
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• 2002

In this article we study on connecting paper 131ding activities of triangle with mathematical proof Folding median, bisector of angle, and hight of paper triangle, we from and extract some ideas that help us to proof some important theorems of plane geometry. In this study using formed ideas in the process of paper folding activities, we suggest some interesting new mathematical proofs of the following theorems: 1. three medians of triangle are intersect in a point; 2. three bisectors of interior angles of triangle are intersect in a point; 3. three heights of triangle are intersect in a point.