Analysis of students critical thinking ability in solving trigonometric problems

Abstract

Abstract In mathematics learning, students’ critical thinking ability is required to understand and solve mathematics problems that require reasoning, analysis, evaluation, and interpretation. Therefore, to describe students’ critical thinking ability, research was conducted on 30 students (15/16 years old) in West Java, Indonesia. This research is qualitative descriptive research and the data collection technique is written test with 3 description questions about trigonometric problems. The test results were analyzed using three indicators of critical thinking ability, (1) composing questions with reasons, (2) identifying relevant and irrelevant data of a mathematical problem, and (3) solving mathematical problems with reasons. The results showed that: (1) almost one-third of the number of students can compile the questions with the reasons, (2) more than one-third of students can identify the relevant and irrelevant data of a mathematical problem, and (3) more than one-third of students can solve the mathematical problems with reasons. The average percentage of students in trigonometric problems is 31,86%. Based on the research result, it is seen that most students do not have good critical thinking ability in solving trigonometric problems.