Why College or University Students Hate Proofs in Mathematics?

概要

論文の詳細を見る
To motivate students who hate proofs to become familiar with mathematical proofs and to help mathematics teachers how to practice proof education in mathematics classes, we investigated in this study the idea of mathematical proofs. To tackle this issue, the modified Moore method of Texas University and a new method (called Z.Mbaitiga method) are introduced following by two cases of studies on proof of triple integral. Next, a survey is conducted on fourth grade students on which of the proposed two cases studies they easily understand or they like. The result of the survey indicated that more than 95% of the students have chosen the case study 2 where all theorems involved in the proof construction are explained in details. From this study we have learned that mathematics teachers have to be very careful about the selection of proofs to include when introducing topics and filtering out certain things which can obscure important ideas.