Abstract
The goal of the study was to understand how pre-service and preschool teachers understand and use the mathematical symbols , and = when comparing figures and shapes of different sizes and thicknesses. Using both quantitative and qualitative methods, we examined a study population of 71 pre-service teachers attending a course for teaching mathematics to pre-schoolers and 149 preschool teachers. Our results show that the majority of participants did not answer the questions correctly, with a significant difference between how the two groups validated their answers, indicating that the participants do not correctly understand that mathematical symbols should (, and = ) only be used in the mathematical context.
Highlights
The goal of the study was to understand how pre-service and preschool teachers understand and use the mathematical symbols , and = when comparing figures and shapes of different sizes and thicknesses. Using both quantitative and qualitative methods, we examined a study population of 71 pre-service teachers attending a course for teaching mathematics to pre-schoolers and 149 preschool teachers
Our results show that the majority of participants did not answer the questions correctly, with a significant difference between how the two groups validated their answers, indicating that the participants do not correctly understand that mathematical symbols should (, and = ) only be used in the mathematical context
A significant difference was found between the two groups: a large number of preschool teachers did not supply any justification for their reasoning (58.4% for question 1, and 57.7%, 60.4%, and 66.4% for questions 2, 3, and 17, respectively) compared to the number of pre-service teachers who did not (19.8%, 14.1%, 16.9%, 28.2%, respectively)
Summary
Mathematical language is a language of symbols, concepts, definitions, and theorems. It does not develop naturally like a child’s natural language, but needs to be taught (Ilany & Margolin, 2010). Children are engaged in mathematics in daily life from birth, and today’s global trend is to introduce.
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