Examining mathematical justification levels of 7th grade students

Abstract

Reasoning and justification are among the core skills that mathematics education aims for students to acquire. Studies indicate that students having these skills are able to formulate meaningful geometric ideas. It is also important that students know the significance underlying the operations and mathematical ideas employed or, in other words, that they be able to justify their solutions while learning geometry. This study analyses the justification skills of 7th-grade students using the survey research pattern. A total of 254 middle school students constitute the research sample. The study made use of a descriptive analysis of the justifications given to four open-ended questions in the geometry knowledge test to examine the data collected using the mixed method incorporating quantitative and qualitative methods. The answers given to the questions were coded as follows: complete and convincing justification, incomplete justification, incorrect justification, and no justification. The findings of the study show that most of the student solutions provided for the said questions requiring justification can be categorized under the title of incorrect justification. Furthermore, the number of complete and cogent justifications is significantly lower. The study concludes that the ability of the participants to come up with complete and cogent justifications is limited.