Assisting Primary School Children to Progress through Their van Hiele's Levels of Geometry Thinking using Google SketchUp

Abstract

This research aims to study the effectiveness of newly-developed learning modules built to assist Malaysian primary students to progress through the first three levels of widely accepted van Hiele's model of geometry thinking. The first part of the paper reviews the background of study focusing on the problems encountered by Malaysian mathematics teachers to practice this model in the classroom using Geometer's Sketchpad. It also includes brief essential information about the learning modules which was built using Google SketchUp. The second part describes methodology adopted in the research which involved quantitative approach of a pre versus post quasi-experimental design ran on a group of forty Year 6 primary school children in Malaysia. The results of comparative single-group mean analysis of the test scores suggest that the learning modules were potential in assisting students to progress through the respective van Hiele's levels of geometry thinking, with all of them demonstrated progression of at least within level.