The Growth of Students' Function Limit Concepts Understanding in Solving Controversial Problems Based on Pirie Kieren's Theory

Abstract

Almost all students understand the limit of a function only up to an intuitive definition and have difficulty understanding the concept of a limit function formally. This study aims to describe the growth of student understanding of functions limit concept in solving controversial problems based on Pirie Kieren's theory. There were twelve Calculus class students in the short semester as participants. The students selected were those who had taken calculus courses. Students are given the task of solving controversial problems to understand the concept of limit functions. There was only one student who showed a growing understanding of the concept of the limit of a function and was interviewed for further exploration. This research is a qualitative descriptive research. Therefore, the researchers analyzed the results of students' work through data reduction, data presentation, and conclusion drawing. The result shows that through controversial problems, students' understanding grows to an inventising level. However, students did ‘fold back’ at the observing level. At this level, students look at or re-read their notebooks to recall previously owned concepts. For further research it is suggested that researchers can design a learning process that can help grow student understanding through controversial problems.