Despite holding wide-ranging experiences with constant velocity and non-zero acceleration, students wrestling with physical science concepts struggle to demarcate the two distinct characteristics of motion. In fact, this prior experience and loose familiarity with associated terminology often act as an obstacle toward a deep and robust…

There is concern about mathematics success and its related pedagogy. Society has seen rapid changes in the economy and technology with a call for these changes to be reflected within the classroom. New methods of teaching mathematics are being sought with the purpose to improve teaching and learning while making mathematics relatable to the new…

This study uses graphs of conductivity measured by a microcomputer-based laboratory (MBL) to promote students' macro, micro, and symbolic representations when learning about net ionic reactions (NIR). A total of 54 students, aged 14-15 years old participated in this research, and were randomly divided into an experimental group (N = 27) and a…

Implementing an integrated sequence of concrete-representational-abstract depictions of mathematics concepts (CRA-I) can improve the mathematics achievement of students with disabilities, and explicit instructional strategies involving problem-solving heuristics and student verbalizations can help facilitate students' conceptual understanding of…

The topic of function transformations is a difficult mathematical topic for school and college students. This article examines how students conceive function transformations after working with GeoGebra, when this conceiving relates to the algebraic representation. The research participants were 19 ninth grade high achieving students who learned,…

This research addresses the issue of how to support students' representational fluency--the ability to create, move within, translate across, and derive meaning from external representations of mathematical ideas. The context of solving linear equations in a combined computer algebra system (CAS) and paper-and-pencil classroom environment is…

Composition of functions is one of the five big ideas identified in NCTM's "Developing Essential Understanding of Functions, Grades 9-12" (Cooney, Beckmann, and Lloyd 2010). Through multiple representations (another big idea) and the use of The Geometer's Sketchpad[R] (GSP), students can directly manipulate variables and thus see dynamic visual…