Profiling
Teachers:
Constructivist- and Behaviorist-
Oriented Mathematics
Copyright ©
2003
NISMED.
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Establishing Conceptual Bases for the Measurement of Volume
Sinan
Olkun
AIBU Egitim Fakultesi
14280 Bolu-TURKEY
solkun@ibu.edu.tr
Fax: 90-374-253 4641
IntroductionMethodsResults
and DiscussionSummary
and Conclusions
ReferencesAppendix
Abstract
Fourth grade students’ understanding of rectangular solids made of small
cubes was investigated. A three-phase procedure was utilized. First, interviews
were conducted individually to assess the students’ level of functioning
in cube-enumeration tasks. Second, participants were engaged in equal
sharing of spatial constructions. Last, postinterviews were conducted
to probe students’ improvements as revealed by their use of enumeration
strategies. Students used three distinct conceptualizations for the arrays
of cubes depending on what they formed as unit and how they structured
the whole building. Initially, their structuring was distracted by the
complexity of buildings and none of them used the same strategies consistently
across problems. During the instruction, they exhibited the same conceptualizations
and transitioned from one to the other. After the intervention, all the
students consistently used layering strategies regardless of the complexity
of the buildings. Equal-sharing situations coupled with coloring activities
paved the road in establishing units, composite units, and unit iteration.
IntroductionMethodsResults
and DiscussionSummary
and Conclusions
ReferencesAppendix