Analyze the effect of teaching and learning with fractals on high school students' affective characteristics of mathematics

Abstract

Objectives As one of the ways to overcome the problem of low defining characteristics of mathematics among Korean students, this study aimed to investigate whether teaching and learning guidance using fractals improves interest and value perception, which are sub-factors of defining characteristics of mathematics. Methods To this end, we conducted a pre- and post-survey on interest and value perception among 18 high school students in grades 1-2 in Seoul, and conducted a t-test on the results. In addition, we analyzed the activity sheets written by students during the 10th session of teaching and learning guidance, and conducted semi-struc-tured interviews with four students about their teaching and learning activities. Results After analyzing the pre- and post-survey results for reliability, a t-test was conducted, and significant re-sults were found in the areas of interest and value perception. We also analyzed activity sheets from each lesson and transcribed and analyzed semi-structured interviews with four students, all of which showed that a variety of fractal-based teaching and learning instruction improved high school students' interest in and perceived value of mathematics. Furthermore, we found that the teaching and learning activities that were affected by the increase in defining characteristics differed across students. Conclusions The findings that fractal-based teaching-learning guidance improves high school students' interest and value perception in mathematics suggest that it is necessary to actively explore various teaching-learning methods to improve students' defining characteristics, and that the activities affected by students' defining char-acteristics are different from each other, providing educational implications for teaching-learning guidance.