Budi Usodo

Describing Relational Thinking Process of Junior High School Students with High Capability

Learning mathematics in Junior High School is transition from arithmetic to algebra. In algebra, students must develop a relational view of the symbol if they are to make any sense of more complicated equations with operations on both sides of the equal sign. The term relational thinking is used here to encompass more than a relational understanding of the equal sign. It is important to discuss students’ relational thinking process when solving unknown number on mathematic sentences, so it can prevents students’ misconception about the meaning of equal sign. Descriptive method was used in this study, involving five students of Junior High School in Boyolali with high capability in mathematics. The result of this study showed that students had a deep understanding about the meaning of equal sign. They knew that the equal sign as symbol of mathematical equivalence. Therefore, they were able to solve the mathematic sentences with relational thinking strategies rather than arithmetic procedures. Keywords—relational thinking, equivalence, equal sign

Gesture analysis of students’ majoring mathematics education in micro teaching process

In the process of learning, especially math learning, process of interaction between teachers and students is certainly a noteworthy thing. In these interactions appear gestures or other body spontaneously. Gesture is an important source of information, because it supports oral communication and reduce the ambiguity of understanding the concept/meaning of the material and improve posture. This research which is particularly suitable for an exploratory research design to provide an initial illustration of the phenomenon. The goal of the research in this article is to describe the gesture of S1 and S2 students of mathematics education at the micro teaching process. To analyze gesture subjects, researchers used McNeil clarification. The result is two subjects using 238 gesture in the process of micro teaching as a means of conveying ideas and concepts in mathematics learning. During the process of micro teaching, subjects using the four types of gesture that is iconic gestures, deictic gesture, regulator ges...

Six to Ten Digits Multiplication Fun Learning Using Puppet Prototype

Logic and technical subjects require students to understand basic knowledge in mathematic. For instance, addition, minus, division and multiplication operations need to be mastered by students due to mathematic complexity as the learning mathematic grows higher. Weak foundation in mathematic also contribute to high failure rate in mathematic subjects in schools. In fact, students in primary schools are struggling to learn mathematic because they need to memorize formulas, multiplication or division operations. To date, this study will develop a puppet prototyping for learning mathematic for six to ten digits multiplication. Ten participants involved in the process of developing the prototype in this study. Students involved in the study were those from the intermediate class students whilst teachers were selected based on their vast knowledge and experiences and have more than five years of experience in teaching mathematic. Close participatory analysis will be used in the prototyping process as to fulfil the requirements of the students and teachers whom will use the puppet in learning six to ten digit multiplication in mathematic. Findings showed that, the students had a great time and fun learning experience in learning multiplication and they able to understand the concept of multiplication using puppet. Colour and materials of the puppet also help to attract student attention during learning. Additionally, students able to visualized and able to calculate accurate multiplication value and the puppet help them to recall in multiplying and adding the digits accordingly.

Mastering the soft skills in the implementation of work based learning among community college students

Emphasizing the aspects of soft skills among students is an important element to produce graduates who are competitive when facing any situations in the workplace. Various efforts have been taken by the Ministry of Education (MOE) and the Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia (MOHE) to improve the education system in Malaysia. Learning methods were introduced to ensure the education systems achieve the educational goals and to produce individuals who are well-balanced with spiritually, emotionally and physically. However, the issue of unemployment among graduates often being spoken in the community and it was regarded as a failure of educational institutions to produce quality graduates. Thus, the method of Work-Based Learning (WBL) was seen as a way to improve the soft skills among the graduates. The study was conducted using quantitative research survey as the design of the study used a questionnaire that was adapted as an instrument. Data were analysed using Statistical Package of Social Science (SPSS) version 20.0. The respondents were consisted of 97 students who attended WBL programs at the community college. Data were obtained from questionnaires using descriptive statistics for the calculation of the mean and one-way ANOVA test. The findings of the level of soft skills among community colleges were high where the communication skills obtained (mean = 4.1218), critical and problem solving skills (mean = 4.0946), teamwork skills (mean = 4.2297), learning and information management (mean = 4.1219), entrepreneurial skills (mean = 4.0240), professional ethics and moral (mean = 3.9410) and leadership skills (mean = 4.2104). The findings also showed the differences in term of communication skills among the community colleges. This study was significant to the community colleges to identify the level of soft skills among students who performed WBL methods in order to reduce the number of unemployment.