Implementing Realistic Mathematics Education for Elementary Schools in Indonesia

In mathematics learning, concepts and contexts are required that students are able to learn from real-life environment. However, teachers generally equip students with formulas without being accompanied by the ability to comprehend basic concepts. Mathematics learning will indeed be enjoyable if it is not only textbook-based but also followed by real-life experience. This study aims to investigate whether local cultural context could foster students’ concept understanding in mathematics learning, particularly plane figures. Therefore, the research will, firstly, describe plane figures learning that uses the Indonesian Realistic Mathematics Education approach via iceberg and, secondly, discover students’ improvement in concept comprehension after applying the approach. 50 elementary school students participated in the research, which employed experimental and descriptive methods. Further, the study results demonstrate an increase in concept comprehension, indicated from the increase in student learning achievement based on the average score of the experimental class and of the control class (88.40 and 72.91 respectively). Next, the independent sample ttest suggests t-count is higher than t-table, therefore Ho is rejected and Ha accepted. Thus, the learning outcomes of the class using the PMRI approach linked to Palembang’s cultural context has increased.