Fostering students' knowledge about proof

Conference contribution (Article) › Research › Peer reviewed

Publication data


ByFemke Sporn, Daniel Sommerhoff, Aiso Heinze
Original languageEnglish
Published inMichal Ayalon, Boris Koichu, Roza Leikin, Laurie Rubel, Michal Tabach (Eds.), Proceedings of the 46th Conference of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education (vol. 4)
Pages235-242
Editor (Publisher)PME
ISBN978-965-93112-4-8
DOI/Linkhttps://www.igpme.org/publications/current-proceedings/ (Open Access)
Publication statusPublished – 07.2023

Empirical research has underlined difficulties regarding knowledge about proof for learners of all ages. As knowledge about proof can indicate an individual’s

understanding of proof, it is thus mandatory to find means to support students

effectively. In an intervention study with 61 9th grade students, we examined to what extent it is possible to foster students’ understanding of proof by explicitly addressing knowledge about proof principles. The intervention covered five lessons integrated in regular mathematics classes distributed over a half school year. The positive effect suggests that the intervention could foster students’ knowledge about proof principles using only a short amount of time. However, the results also raise questions regarding the explicit formulation of rules and criteria for mathematical proof.