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Relationship between children's mathematical word problem posing and grade level, problem-solving ability and task type
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Type
Thesis
Author
Yeap, Ban Har
Supervisor
Kaur, Berinderjeet
Abstract
This study investigated the relationship between children's mathematical word problem-posing ability and three variables, namely, grade level, problem-solving ability and task type. Two variables were subject variables while one was a task variable. The subjects of the study were primary three (eight years old) and primary five (ten years old) children.
The research design involved the development of a scheme to analyse word problems posed by children. The scheme assigns a solvable arithmetic word problem a higher problem-posing index if the problem is more difficult for the peers of the problem-poser. The derivation of the problem-posing index is based on semantic characteristics of word problems. It was found that this scheme was able to be used to analyse most of the children's problem-posing responses in the present study. The inter-coder reliability of this analysis scheme was found to be high, even among novice coders. A part of the study involved the validation of this scheme. In the validation investigation, semantic characteristics that contributed significantly to the difficulty of word problems were identified. A total of 552 primary three and primary five children participated in the validation investigation.
A total of 330 primary three and 330 primary five children in three Singapore schools participated in the main study. These children had not been exposed to explicit problem-posing activities prior to this study. The relationship between children's problem-posing ability and grade level, problem-solving ability and task type were investigated quantitatively. It was found that children in the higher grade level were better problem-posers. The study also found a strong positive relationship between problem-posing ability and problem-solving ability, particularly among the younger children. The interaction effect between grade level and problem-solving ability was, however, not statistically significant.
The word problems posed by 220 children with high problem-posing ability were analysed qualitatively to identify categories of problem-posing processes. It was found that these children demonstrated five categories of processes when they posed word problems. The processes were (1) posing 'primitives', (2) posing related problems, (3) constructing meaning for number sentences, (4) engaging in metacognitive processes and (5) making connection to own experiences, including experiences with textbook problems. Some of the processes were task-specific while others were common to all.
The study also involved the development of a scheme to classify the wide variety of problem-posing tasks used in instruction and research studies. It was found that tasks with constraints and tasks that included a text were more difficult for children to pose solvable problems. This was particularly true for children in the lower grade level and children with lower problem-solving ability. It was also found that tasks that were open and tasks that contained rich information tended to encourage children to pose semantically complex problems.
The research design involved the development of a scheme to analyse word problems posed by children. The scheme assigns a solvable arithmetic word problem a higher problem-posing index if the problem is more difficult for the peers of the problem-poser. The derivation of the problem-posing index is based on semantic characteristics of word problems. It was found that this scheme was able to be used to analyse most of the children's problem-posing responses in the present study. The inter-coder reliability of this analysis scheme was found to be high, even among novice coders. A part of the study involved the validation of this scheme. In the validation investigation, semantic characteristics that contributed significantly to the difficulty of word problems were identified. A total of 552 primary three and primary five children participated in the validation investigation.
A total of 330 primary three and 330 primary five children in three Singapore schools participated in the main study. These children had not been exposed to explicit problem-posing activities prior to this study. The relationship between children's problem-posing ability and grade level, problem-solving ability and task type were investigated quantitatively. It was found that children in the higher grade level were better problem-posers. The study also found a strong positive relationship between problem-posing ability and problem-solving ability, particularly among the younger children. The interaction effect between grade level and problem-solving ability was, however, not statistically significant.
The word problems posed by 220 children with high problem-posing ability were analysed qualitatively to identify categories of problem-posing processes. It was found that these children demonstrated five categories of processes when they posed word problems. The processes were (1) posing 'primitives', (2) posing related problems, (3) constructing meaning for number sentences, (4) engaging in metacognitive processes and (5) making connection to own experiences, including experiences with textbook problems. Some of the processes were task-specific while others were common to all.
The study also involved the development of a scheme to classify the wide variety of problem-posing tasks used in instruction and research studies. It was found that tasks with constraints and tasks that included a text were more difficult for children to pose solvable problems. This was particularly true for children in the lower grade level and children with lower problem-solving ability. It was also found that tasks that were open and tasks that contained rich information tended to encourage children to pose semantically complex problems.
Date Issued
2002
Call Number
QA63 Yea
Date Submitted
2002