Promotion of Students’ Achievement in Geometry using Van Hiele Model in Secondary Level

Abstract

This thesis is entitled “Promotion of Students’ Achievement in Geometry Using Van Hiele Model in Secondary Level”. The objectives of this study were to dig out the level of mathematics students of secondary level compared with Van Hiele model and to explore to attitude of the students about Van Hiele model of teaching geometry at grade nine. The design of the study is mixed research design. Two government school were selected by purposive sampling. The respondents of this study were all students of grade 9 from selected two school. To collect data, the researcher used document analysis, Van Hiele Geometry Test, and clinical interview as research tool. The researcher analyzed geometry syllabus of grade nine and past geometry yearly examina tion questions in document analysis. The research from the study indicated that many of the selected school students who participated in the research have a weak conceptual understanding of geometric concept. Most of the students were functioning at Van Hiele level 0 and 1. The students who participated in the study were functioning at a level that do not fit with their mathematics curriculum. There were better performance of school B than school A. Researcher found the condition that some students wrote the correct answer of upper level without answering the previous level. Through the interview it was found that this condition arises due to the rote learning, guessing, learning rules or definitions by rote or by applying routine algorithms that they didn’t understand. The main challenge found by this research study was that the participants lacked conceptual understanding of geometric concepts. The teaching and learning of geometry should be conduct program to improve result. When teaching about geometric shapes and concepts, teacher should ensure that the proper geometric terminologies are used by both teacher and students. Students can only recognize, describe and distinguish geometric shapes from each other by knowing their properties. Teacher should focus to student to study the structure of geometry, student should be self-motive to learn geometry, generate rules and regulation side of school, student and teacher to promote the achievement in geometry.