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Conference paper
Student understanding of function concepts in K-16: Consistency and misconceptions
University of West Florida Libraries
Rocky Mountain Educational Research Association Annual Meeting (Pensacola, Florida, 2014)
2014
Abstract
Function concepts are essential in K-12 and post-secondary mathematics (CCSSM, 2010; Carraher & Schliemann, 2007). Understanding function concepts is complex for students, even for high-performing undergraduates who finished calculus (Breidenback, Dubinsky, Hawks, & Nichols, 1992). Students mainly focused on algebraic manipulations in courses (Carlson & Oehrtman, 2005). Previous studies have documented students’ misconceptions and difficulties when learning the function concepts (e.g., Breudenback et al., 1992); however, there is a dearth of research examining how misconceptions related to functions are similar or different among multiple age groups. There have been multiple efforts to design tasks to help students develop a robust understanding of functions concept tasks (such as Identify Functions developed by Steketee and Scher,2012). Examining the effectiveness of such efforts is essential to promoting the intervention in classrooms.
In this proposal, we report our preliminary analysis of an ongoing research study investigating how student understanding of function concepts in different K-16 levels. We examined the following research questions:
1. How do students define and represent functions?
2. How do students’ definitions of functions change as the result of completing the tasks identify functions?
Details
- Title
- Student understanding of function concepts in K-16
- Resource Type
- Conference paper
- Conference
- Rocky Mountain Educational Research Association Annual Meeting (Pensacola, Florida, 2014)
- Publisher
- University of West Florida Libraries; Argo Scholar Commons
- Format
- pdf
- Number of pages
- 9
- Copyright
- Permission granted to the University of West Florida Libraries to digitize and/or display this information for non-profit research and educational purposes. Any reuse of this item in excess of fair use or other copyright exemptions requires the permission of the copyright holder.
- Identifiers
- 99380090327106600
- Academic Unit
- School of Edu
- Language
- English