Students’ metacognitive skills in solving word problem

Abstract

Problem solving is the primary purpose of the mathematics curriculum. Metacognitive skills play an important role in problem solving. Solving mathematics word problem is a part of the problem solving. Students need appropriate steps and strategies to solve word problems and, in many cases, each student uses different strategy in solving word problem. This is because the difference of mathematical ability. This study aimed to describe the profile of metacognitive skills of students with high math ability and low math ability in solving the mathematics word problem, from the aspects of metacognitive skills of planning, monitoring and evaluating. The type of this research is qualitative descriptive. Subjects of the study are two students of Senior High School in Yogyakarta. Data collection techniques are observation, test, documentation and interviews. The validity of the data using a triangulation method. Data analysis techniques of this research are data reduction, data display, and conclusion/verification. The results of the study show that students who have high mathematical abilities meet the indicators of metacognitive skills in the planning, monitoring and evaluating stages. While students who have low mathematical abilities meet indicators of metacognitive skills in the planning stage but, have not fully met the indicators of metacognitive skills in the monitoring and evaluating stages in solving problems.