• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
• /
• v.30 no.7
• /
• pp.920-932
• /
• 2010

Many topics in science, especially, abstract concepts, relationships, properties, entities in invisible ranges, are described in mathematical representations such as formula, numbers, symbols, and graphs. Although the mathematical representation is an essential tool to better understand scientific phenomena, the mathematical element is pointed out as a reason for learning difficulty and losing interests in science. In order to further investigate the relationship between mathematics knowledge and science understanding, the current study examined 793 high school students' understanding of the pH value. As a measure of the molar concentration of hydrogen ions in the solution, the pH value is an appropriate example to explore what a student mathematical structure of logarithm is and how they interpret the proportional relationship of numbers for scientific explanation. To the end, students were asked to write their responses on a questionnaire that is composed of nine content domain questions and four affective domain questions. Data analysis of this study provides information for the relationship between student understanding of the pH value and related mathematics knowledge.

• School Mathematics
• /
• v.3 no.2
• /
• pp.233-248
• /
• 2001

In pthis aper, mathematical terms in 7th elementary mathematics curriculum(from now, in short, 7th curriculum)are reexamined critically. In 7th curriculum there are 123 terms, which seems to be selected cautiously But it is not sure. There are lots of evidences for selecting terms incautiously, Through these evidences, following conclusions are induced: (1) Terms were not selected strictly. There are many terms omitted in 7th curriculum, which are necessary for understanding mathematical concepts. (2) There were no rational principles for selecting terms in 7th curriculum. Any rational principles can not be found out among terms in 7th curriculum. (3) Mathematical terms and real life terms in 7th curriculum were not distinguished explicitly. There were some real life terms in 7th curriculum, which were significant for understanding mathematical concepts. But other real life terms which is significant also for understanding mathematical concepts were not contained in 7th curriculum.

• East Asian mathematical journal
• /
• v.35 no.2
• /
• pp.173-197
• /
• 2019

The purpose of this study is to analyze expressions in the first and second grade math textbooks in elementary school in the aspect of possibilities of learners' understanding and propose proper directions for expressions in math textbooks to increase the possibilities of their understanding. The findings show that there were four types of expression errors and five types of mathematical errors in the aspects of expression method and content, respectively.

• Research in Mathematical Education
• /
• v.9 no.2 s.22
• /
• pp.125-133
• /
• 2005

This paper investigates student conceptual understanding and application on algebra using problem-based curricula. Seven principles which National Research Council announced were considered because these seven principles all involved in the development of a deep conceptual understanding. A problem-based curriculum itself provides a significant contribution to improving student learning. A problem-based curriculum encourages students to obtain a more conceptual understanding in algebra. From the results the national curriculum developers in Korea consider the problem-based curriculum.

• Research in Mathematical Education
• /
• v.6 no.1
• /
• pp.39-51
• /
• 2002

This study described an elementary teacher's practical knowledge of selecting and using mathematical tasks for promoting students' understanding and discourse. The informant of this ethnographic inquiry was a third grade teacher and has 10 years of teaching experience. According to the analysis of multiple data sources, this study showed that based on his beliefs about the development of understanding of mathematics and discourse, he continually employed two different types of tasks: open-ended tasks and tasks from students' mistakes and comments during discourse. Teachers' practical knowledge of teaching mathematics and the classroom norms for students' understanding and discourse are suggested to be given attention for further research on this area.

• Journal of Educational Research in Mathematics
• /
• v.18 no.1
• /
• pp.123-135
• /
• 2008

This study analysed the schemata which are requisite to understand and prove examples of mathematical induction, and examined students' construction of the schemata. We verified that the construction of implication-valued function schema and modus ponens schema needs function schema and proposition-valued function schema, and needs synthetic coordination for successive mathematical induction schema. Given this background, we establish $1{\sim}4$ levels for students' understanding of the mathematical induction. Further, we analysed cognitive difficulties of students who studying mathematical induction in connection with these understanding levels.

• Journal of Elementary Mathematics Education in Korea
• /
• v.13 no.2
• /
• pp.141-161
• /
• 2009

Mathematical Communication ability can be more developed through sharing thoughts with others. Therefore when we instruct students in math, it is very important for teachers to provide them with opportunity to communicate mathematically. So this study provided open-ended problems in small-group collaborative learning. And we analyzed students' mathematical communication focused on the student's level of understanding. Furthermore, to improve students' mathematical communication ability, this study tries to attract the factors that we should consider the exact date for inserting the open-ended problems into a course of math and the student's level of understanding for selecting suitable open-ended problems.

• Communications of Mathematical Education
• /
• v.23 no.2
• /
• pp.429-459
• /
• 2009

The purpose of this study was to help the students deepen their mathematical understanding and practitioner improve her mathematics lessons. The teacher-researcher developed mathematical situation based problem solving instruction model which was modified from PBL(Problem Based Learning instruction model). Three lessons were performed in the cycle of reflection, plan, and action. As a result of performance, reflective knowledges were noted as followed points; students' mathematical understanding, mathematical situation based problem solving instruction model, improvement of mathematics teachers.

• The Mathematical Education
• /
• v.45 no.1 s.112
• /
• pp.61-74
• /
• 2006

The ability of understanding the number and number systems, grasping the properties of number systems, and manipulating number systems is the foundation to understand algebra. It is useful to deepen students' mathematical understanding of number systems and operations. The authentic understanding of numbers and operations can make it possible for the students to manipulate algebraic symbols, to represent relationship among sets of numbers, and to use variables to investigate the properties of sets of numbers. The high school students need to understand the number systems from more abstract perspective. The purpose of this study is to study on understanding and application ability of eleventh graders of basic properties of operations with real numbers.

• Research in Mathematical Education
• /
• v.18 no.1
• /
• pp.1-29
• /
• 2014

When taught the precise definition of ${\pi}$, students may be simply asked to memorize its approximate value without developing a rigorous understanding of the underlying reason of why it is a constant. Measuring the circumferences and diameters of various circles and calculating their ratios might just represent an attempt to verify that ${\pi}$ has an approximate value of 3.14, and will not necessarily result in an adequate understanding about the constant nor formally proves that it is a constant. In this study, we aim to investigate prospective teachers' conceptual understanding of ${\pi}$, and as a constant and whether they can provide a proof of its constant property. The findings show that prospective teachers lack a holistic understanding of the constant nature of ${\pi}$, and reveal how they teach students about this property in an inappropriate approach through a proving activity. We conclude our findings with a suggestion on how to improve the situation.