PROCEEDINGS OF THE 19TH ANNUAL CONFERENCE ON RESEARCH IN UNDERGRADUATE MATHEMATICS EDUCATION
2016
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Obstacles in developing robust proportional reasoning structures: A story of teachers’ thinking about the shape task
Page: 1412
This paper presents some initial findings of an investigation focused on mathematics teachers’ ways of thinking about proportional relationships, with an emphasis on multiplicative reasoning. Deficiencies in proportional reasoning among teachers can be serious impediments to the development of robust reasoning among their students. As such, this study focuses on how mathematics teachers reason through tasks that involve proportional reasoning by addressing the following two research questions: (1) In what ways do teachers reason through a specific task designed to elicit proportional reasoning? and (2) What difficulties do teachers encounter while reasoning through such tasks? This paper discusses the construction of a robust proportional reasoning structure in the context of a specific task and discusses one particular obstacle, which impedes the construction of such a structure.