The study explored the effect of the activity-based approach (ABA) on grade 11 learners' performance in solving two-dimensional (2D) trigonometric problems. A sequential explanatory design was used, starting with the quantitative, followed by the qualitative method. The experimental group (EG) and the control group (CG) were facilitated using ABA, while CG was taught using traditional teaching approach. A 2D trigonometry test was used as a pre-and posttest to measure learners' performance. EG's experiences of using ABA were captured through focus group interviews. The study findings reveal significant differences between EG and CG posttests [t(100)=.3. 95; p=.05] with Cohen d=.79. Also, ABA did not segregate between boys and girls. Despite ABA being time-consuming, learners in EG developed collaborative skills, trigonometry vocabulary, the ability to solve trigonometric problems, and learning autonomy, which improved their performance. The study recommends ABA to improve learners' performance.

This article presents an interpretive analysis of three different mathematics teaching cases to establish where the bigger picture should lie in the teaching and learning of mathematics. We use pre-existing data collected through pre-observation and post-observation interviews and passive classroom observation undertaken by the third author in two different Grade 11 classes taught by two different teachers at one high school. Another set of data was collected through participant observation of the second author’s Year 2 University class. We analyse the presence or absence of the bigger picture, especially, in the teachers’ questioning strategies and their approach to content, guided by Tall’s framework of three worlds of mathematics, namely the ‘conceptual-embodied’ world, the ‘proceptual-symbolic’ world and the ‘axiomatic-formal’ world. Within this broad framework we acknowledge Pirie and Kieren’s notion of folding back towards the attainment of an axiomatic-formal world. We argue that the teaching and learning of mathematics should remain anchored in the bigger picture and, in that way, mathematics is meaningful, accessible, expandable and transferable.

In this paper, we explored the type of mathematical connections Grade 11 learners make when solving two-dimensional (2D) trigonometric problems in an Activity-Based Learning (ABL) environment. We followed a qualitative case study design within an interpretive paradigm. Convenience sampling was used to select a whole class of 45 Grade 11 learners from one of the public non-fee-paying secondary schools in Capricorn District, Limpopo Province of South Africa. Group work presentations and classroom interactions were used to collect data. Data were analyzed using deductive thematic analysis guided by the mathematical connections’ framework. The findings indicated that learners managed to make procedural, meaning, reversibility, different representations, feature, and inclusion part whole as well as integrated connections as they worked on 2D trigonometric problems in an ABL environment. We established that learners did not make generalization part-whole connections. In addition, we found that some learners lacked mathematical connections skills and failed to solve the problems. Engaging learners in an ABL environment provided a fine-grained approach that allowed them to make mathematical connections. We, therefore, recommend that teachers should create an ABL environment to enable learners to make different types of mathematics connections during the teaching and learning of trigonometric concepts.

No abstract

No abstract