Pre-service Secondary Mathematics Teachers’ Behaviors in the Proving Process

Işıkhan Uğurel; Hasibe Sevgi Moralı; Melike Yiğit-Koyunkaya; Özge Karahan

doi:10.12973/eurasia.2016.1523a

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Işıkhan Uğurel ¹ ^* , Hasibe Sevgi Moralı ¹, Melike Yiğit-Koyunkaya ¹, Özge Karahan ¹

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¹ Dokuz Eylul University, Faculty of Buca Education^* Corresponding Author

Abstract

Background:
Pre-service secondary mathematics teachers’ (PSMTs) understanding and ability of constructing a proof is not only important for their own learning process, but also important to help their students to gain the ability to do proof in their future teaching. Therefore, this study is focused on and explained PSMTs’ behaviors that they revealed throughout the proving process of a proposition.

Materials and methods:
In this qualitative case study, the participants were fifteen volunteer PSMTs from a public university in Turkey. The participants were given a proposition which they were asked to think aloud and prove it on the blackboard.

Results:
In detail, PSMTs had difficulties in application of mathematical language and notations, understanding the meaning of the given proposition, knowing where to get started on a proof, using examples efficiently, using appropriate and efficient methods to construct the proof, and defining logical structures of the proposition to construct the proof.

Conclusions:
The findings of this study show that PSMTs’ behaviors and thoughts regarding the given proposition were limited.

Keywords

proof
proving
pre-service secondary mathematics teachers
teacher education

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This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Article Type: Research Article

EURASIA J Math Sci Tech Ed, Volume 12, Issue 2, February 2016, 203-231

https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2016.1523a

Publication date: 11 Nov 2015

Article Views: 2219

Article Downloads: 977

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How to cite this article

APA

Uğurel, I., Moralı, H. S., Yiğit-Koyunkaya, M., & Karahan, Ö. (2016). Pre-service Secondary Mathematics Teachers’ Behaviors in the Proving Process. Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, 12(2), 203-231. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2016.1523a

Vancouver

Uğurel I, Moralı HS, Yiğit-Koyunkaya M, Karahan Ö. Pre-service Secondary Mathematics Teachers’ Behaviors in the Proving Process. EURASIA J Math Sci Tech Ed. 2016;12(2):203-31. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2016.1523a

AMA

Uğurel I, Moralı HS, Yiğit-Koyunkaya M, Karahan Ö. Pre-service Secondary Mathematics Teachers’ Behaviors in the Proving Process. EURASIA J Math Sci Tech Ed. 2016;12(2), 203-231. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2016.1523a

Chicago

Uğurel, Işıkhan, Hasibe Sevgi Moralı, Melike Yiğit-Koyunkaya, and Özge Karahan. "Pre-service Secondary Mathematics Teachers’ Behaviors in the Proving Process". Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education 2016 12 no. 2 (2016): 203-231. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2016.1523a

Harvard

Uğurel, I., Moralı, H. S., Yiğit-Koyunkaya, M., and Karahan, Ö. (2016). Pre-service Secondary Mathematics Teachers’ Behaviors in the Proving Process. Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, 12(2), pp. 203-231. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2016.1523a

MLA

Uğurel, Işıkhan et al. "Pre-service Secondary Mathematics Teachers’ Behaviors in the Proving Process". Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, vol. 12, no. 2, 2016, pp. 203-231. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2016.1523a