Configural reasoning as coordination of visualisation process

Abstract

This study identifies visualisation processes in student primary teachers when they solve geometry problems requiring mathematical proof, in a pencil-and-paper environment. The results reveal the importance of the initial diagrams that accompany the problems, as well as subsequent modifications of these diagrams in the development of discursive and operative apprehension, constituting as they do links between mathematical reasoning processes and the visualisation of geometry-problem solving in a paper-and-pencil context. Finally, we identify the possible causes of those limitations that hinder the development of such apprehension.

Keywords

• visualisation
• apprehension
• configural reasoning
• problem solving
• mathematical proof