Students’ Challenge with Multiple Solution Tasks: Determining the Strategies Used in Tasks

Abstract

Multiple solution tasks are defined as mathematical situations which can be proved in more than one way or as mathematical tasks that can be solved in more than one way so that students can reach the same result by using different methods. Multiple solution tasks, which support the development of students’ skills related to interrogation, reasoning, research and making comments, have a close relationship with the processes of mathematical thinking and creativity. The purpose of this study, which focuses on multiple solution tasks, was to determine different solution strategies used by students for multiple solution tasks. The participants of the study were 76 freshman students attending the department of Elementary School Mathematics Teaching. As the data collection tool, an open-ended test made up of two multiple solution tasks was used. The students were asked to solve each task in thirty minutes in as many ways as they could. Following this, clinical interviews were held with six students selected among all the participants. The data collected were analyzed qualitatively. The results revealed that most of the students found more ways of solution to the geometry task than the pattern-related task and that they did not find many/different ways for individual solutions for the tasks, though.