Students' Errors in Solving Powers and Roots Based on AVAEM (ARITH, VAR, AE, EQS, and MATH) Categories

Abstract

A power can be seen as the product of multiplying a number by itself, whereas the root is the opposite of power. These topics are very important to be understood by junior high school students. This study aims to describe students’ errors in solving powers and roots tasks based on AVAEM (ARITH, VAR, AE, EQS, and MATH) categories. The type of this research is qualitative research with a case-study design. The subjects of this research were 4 students of grade 9, at a junior high school in Banjarmasin, South Borneo. Data were collected using tests and interviews. During the study, it was found that errors made by students included errors in applying arithmetic operations (ARITH), errors in understanding and distinguishing the roles of literal symbols (VAR), errors in understanding algebraic expressions (AE), errors in distinguishing the meaning of the “=” sign (EQS), and errors in mathematization (MATH). Errors made by students in solving tasks are the gateway to analyzing the existence of learning obstacles. Therefore, the implication of this study is the a first step to investigate learning obstacles experienced by students in powers and root forms. Keywords: students’ errors, solving powers, roots based on AVAEM