The Influence of Mathematical Tasks on Mathematical Communication

수학적 과제가 수학적 의사소통에 미치는 영향

The purpose of this study was to analyze the influence of mathematical tasks on mathematical communication. Mathematical tasks were classified into four different levels according to cognitive demands, such as memorization, procedure, concept, and exploration. For this study, 24 students were selected from the 5th grade of an elementary school located in Seoul. They were randomly assigned into six groups to control the effects of extraneous variables on the main study. Mathematical tasks for this study were developed on the basis of cognitive demands and then two different tasks were randomly assigned to each group. Before the experiment began, students were trained for effective communication for two months. All the procedures of students' learning were videotaped and transcripted. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were applied to analyze the data. The findings of this study point out that the levels of mathematical tasks were positively correlated to students' participation in mathematical communication, meaning that tasks with higher cognitive demands tend to promote students' active participation in communication with inquiry-based questions. Secondly, the result of this study indicated that the level of students' mathematical justification was influenced by mathematical tasks. That is, the forms of justification changed toward mathematical logic from authorities such as textbooks or teachers according to the levels of tasks. Thirdly, it found out that tasks with higher cognitive demands promoted various negotiation processes. The results of this study implies that cognitively complex tasks should be offered in the classroom to promote students' active mathematical communication, various mathematical tasks and the diverse teaching models should be developed, and teacher education should be enhanced to improve teachers' awareness of mathematical tasks.

수학교육에서 수학적 의사소통을 강화하는 것은 교사에게 많은 것을 의존하는 교실 상황을 학생들이 그들 자신의 생각을 책임지는 상황으로 바꾸는데 도움을 준다. 이 연구는 수학적 의사소통에서 중요한 역할을 할 것으로 예상되는 수학적 과제가 수학적 의사소통에 미치는 영향에 대하여 탐구하였다. 이를 위해 인지적 요구수준에 따라 수학적 과제를 암기형, 절차형, 개념원리형, 탐구형으로 나누고, 각 과제 유형에 따라 학생들의 수학적 의사소통 참여, 수학적 정당화 유형, 수학적 합의과정이 어떻게 달라지는지 양적 분석방법과 질적 분석방법을 병행하여 살펴보았다. 수학적 과제는 학생들의 수학적 의사소통과 밀접한 연관성을 갖고 있으며, 어떤 과제로 학습하느냐에 따라 학습 효과는 달라진다. 따라서 해결방법이 다양하고 인지적 요구수준이 높은 수학적 과제를 제공하는 것은 학생들의 수학적 의사소통 능력을 향상시키는데 중요하다.