The Effects of a Functional Thinking Intervention on Fifth-Grade Students’ Functional Thinking Skills

Gülnur AKIN & Işıl İŞLER BAYKAL

ABSTRACT
The purpose of the study was to investigate the effects of a functional thinking intervention on 5th-grade students’ functional thinking skills. The sample was 43 fifth grade students in two public middle schools in Ankara, in which 20 of them constituted the experimental group in one school, and 23 of them constituted the control group in the other school. The experimental group participated in a functional thinking intervention lasting 12 hours (about three weeks). A Functional Thinking Test (FTT) was applied as a pre-and post-test to both groups. The quantitative data was supported by analyzing students’ functional thinking strategies qualitatively. The results showed that there was not a significant mean difference between the experimental and control group at pre-test or post-test. However, the experimental group showed significant pre-to-post gains. Also, experimental group students were significantly better at using variables in defining the function rule after the functional thinking intervention.

KEYWORDS: Functional Thinking, Early Algebra, Recursive Pattern, Covariational Thinking, Correspondence Thinking

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