Improving Students' Proportional Thinking Using Schema-Based Instruction

By Asha K. Jitendra, Jon Star, Michael C. Rodriguez, M. Lindell, Fumio Someki. 2011

80 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Abstract This study investigated the effectiveness of an instructional program (schema-based instruction, SBI) designed to teach 7th graders how to comprehend and solve proportion problems involving ratios/rates, scale drawings, and percents. The SBI program emphasized the underlying mathematical structure of problems via schematic diagrams, focused on a 4-step procedure to support and monitor problem solving, and addressed the flexible use of alternative solution strategies based on the problem situation. Blocking by teacher at three middle schools, the authors randomly assigned the 21 classrooms to one of two conditions: SBI and control. Classroom teachers provided the instruction. Results of multilevel modeling used to test for treatment effects after accounting for pretests and other characteristics (gender, ethnicity) revealed the direct effects of SBI on mathematical problem solving at posttest. However, the improved problem solving skills were not maintained a month later when SBI was no longer in effect nor did the skills transfer to solving problems in new domain-level content.

Subfields: Applied Mathematics, Education, Statistics and Probability

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/a5c3dcc34f1398c86a0f555432d55a7502045f12

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In Applied Mathematics

In Education

In Statistics and Probability

Citations in the corpus

Effects of Intervention to Improve At-Risk Fourth Graders’ Understanding, Calculations, and Word Problems with Fractions (2016, background): “…to WPs in the two intervention conditions was rooted in schema-based instruction (e.g., Fuchs et al., 2003, 2009, 2010; Jitendra & Star, 2012; Jitendra et al., 2009, 2011), an approach that teaches students to identify WPs as belonging to WP types that share structural features (splitting…”
Effectiveness of Schema-Based Instruction for Improving Seventh-Grade Students’ Proportional Reasoning: A Randomized Experiment (2013, result): “24) when students in SBI classes were compared to control students and exceeded the effect sizes reported in the SBI literature for ratio, proportion, and percent problem solving when delivered by classroom teachers rather than researchers (Jitendra et al., 2009; Jitendra et al., 2011).”
Teaching and Learning About Whole Numbers in Primary School (2016, background): “…best fits with a problem; however, it has been found to improve children’s problem-solving skills beyond the effects of peer interaction and to enhance problem-solving skills in children who have difficulties with mathematics (e.g., Fuchs et al. 2004a, b, 2010; Jitendra et al. 2007, 2009, 2011).”