The thinking processes of mathematics problem solving of form four secondary school students / Paul Lau Ngee Kiong ... [et al.]

This report presents the findings of a research project, which examined the ability of Form Four students solving mathematics problems of different levels of difficulty proposed by Polya (1981), the problem solving skills employed by Form Four students and the metacognitive decisions of Form Four students while solving mathematics problems.The research consisted of two parts. Part I was predominantly quantitative and Part Il was qualitative. 137 mathematics teachers and 412 Form Four students from the Sri Aman Division for the year 2002 participated in Part I of this research. On top of answering mathematics problems from the four levels of difficulty prepared by the researchers, the students had to complete three sets of questionnaires. The participating teachers needed to complete one set of questionnaire. Part Il of this research involved 18 Form Four students identified by the researchers. The answering sessions of these students were video taped separately. Interviews with the students were conducted and audio taped. The data collected was analyzed to answer the objectives of this research.