Multiple Representations: An Important Process in Learning-Teaching of Fractions

A relatively large number of 4th-grade public primary school students in Iran did not perform at acceptable levels in the national and international assessment of mathematics (such as, TIMSS, 2003, 2007). One concept that poses significant difficulty for these students and negatively affects their overall mathematics achievement is fractions. Many researchers have attributed these difficulties primarily to traditional instruction of fraction that emphasizes on procedural rather than conceptual knowledge. Therefore this study was designed to investigate the effect of a multi-representational instruction on student conceptual understanding of fraction concepts. The participants of the study were 40 students at two primary schools. This study utilized a quasi-experimental design in which students at one school (control) learn fraction concepts with a traditional instructional approach while students at the other school (treatment) learn these concepts with an instructional approach simultaneously introducing multiple representations. The effect of a multi-representational instruction on students’ understanding was assessed with a pretest and posttest. For deeper investigation of the process of understanding and thinking of students, qualitative interviews were also conducted with three participants from each school.  The findings of the study indicated that students in treatment group scored significantly higher, and develop of the conceptual understanding of the concept of fractions, and therefore they have less misconception when learning fraction concepts. Besides the findings of the study, indicated that students in treatment group have resistant learning of concept of fractions.