Preservice Teachers' Performances at Mathematical Modeling Process and Views on Mathematical Modeling

Abstract

In changing world conditions what we expect fundamentally from our students are to cope with the problems they confronted in their lives thinking creatively and analytically. Mathematical modeling is a kind of problem solving in which real life situations are expressed mathematically. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the preservice mathematics teachers' performances in the mathematical modeling process and to determine their views of modeling process. With this aim 4 modeling activities were given to 60 preservice teachers in a teacher training program. Afterwards semi structured interviews were conducted with four of these students. Results were interpreted in the context of teachers' competencies in modeling process. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.