A Study on the Visualization Skills of 6th Grade Students

Abstract

Visualization is an effective method for students to internalize concepts and to establish correlations between concepts. Visualization method is especially more important in mathematics which is perceived as the combination of abstract concepts. In this study, whether 6th grade students can solve questions about 'Fractions' by using visual model and whether they can utilize visualization or not was searched. A literature scan about the visualization in teaching mathematics and an achievement test involving 10 questions were implemented for this study. The participants are 50 6th grade students who are studying at public and private schools in various parts of Istanbul. They were asked to solve questions by using visual model method. In accordance with the findings, it can be said that 6th grade students have difficulties in using visual model while studying on fractions and they prefer calculation by considering rules without using.

Learning Mathematical Modeling: How is Junior High School Students’ Motivation Through Visual_Formed Problems?

“…According to SP2, the visual question could innovate learning, provide inspiration, and make it more enthusiastic. This was consistent with the statement that using visualization to make students competent about a topic was very significant in bringing their interest to the lesson [6]. It showed SP2's interest in learning with the visual question.…”

“…It showed that the former were more interesting than the latter. This was consistent with the statement that using visualization to make students competent about a topic was very significant in bringing their interest to the lesson [6].…”

“…The selection of context was inspired by the research conducted by Hoongland et all stating that the students preferred the visual questions than the text questions [16]. Visualization was also able to increase the students' understanding of the material being studied [6]. Based on the results of interviews conducted with 3 students, they found learning with the mathematical modeling interesting and exciting.…”

“…They consider it a difficult, boring, and monotonous subject [4,5] so their motivation to learn mathematics decreases. This will have an effect on the problem solving performance and student achievement [6]. Those who have good motivation and achievement can be characterized by various factors including being able to think rationally, passionate about the learning process, and have good problem solving skills [7,8].…”

“…In this research, the use of visual questions was inspired by research conducted by Hoongland et all, stating that students preferred the visual questions to the text questions. Visualization was also able to increase students' understanding of the materials they were studying and could help them get meaningful learning using various learning media, including pictures, chart, visualization, diagram, table, etc [6]. This made the researchers interested in using the visualization media to make it easier for students to understand the concepts and information in the questions given.…”