Children’s concepts about the slope of a line graph
department or school: Education, Faculty of
data provider: DSpace
degree campus: UBCV
creator: Dayson, Gaynor
issued: 2010-06-02T22:14:11Z
issued: 1985
related degree: Master of Arts - MA
degree grantor: University of British Columbia
description: This study is concerned with how children interpret the slope of a line graph. Today with the vast accumulations of data which are available from computers, people are being faced with an ever increasing amount of pictorial representation of this data. Therefore it is of the utmost importance that children understand pictorial representation. Yet in spite of the popularity of graphs as tools of communication, studies show that many adults experience difficulty in reading information presented in a graphical form. The slope of the graph was chosen for this investigation because it is in this aspect of graphing (as shown by the results of the 1981 B.C. Assessment) that children in British Columbia seem to have the greatest difficulty when they reach Grade 8. The study dealt with positive, negative, zero and infinite slopes, combinations of these slopes, curvilinear graphs and qualitative graphs, that is, graphs that have no numerical data shown on the axes. The researcher chose to use a structured individual interview as a means of collecting data about how the students interpreted the slope of a line graph. Graphs used in the interviews dealt with temperature, height, weight and distance. Twenty-two students were chosen for this study. The students were found to have problems mainly with graphs dealing with distance related to time. This problem may be due to the fact that many students read only one axis and when interpreting distance seem to include direction as an added dimension of the graph. Infinite slope graphs were misinterpreted by every student, which may be due to the fact that they ignore the time axis. In general students used two methods of interpreting graphs. In some cases they observed the direction of the graph from left to right, that is, whether the slope went up or down from left to right. In other cases they examined the end points on the graph and drew their conclusions from them. The choice of method varied with the contextual material shown o…
aggregated CHO: https://circle.library.ubc.ca/rest/handle/2429/25377
note: CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS ABOUT THE SLOPE OF A LINE GRAPH By GAYNOR DAYSON B.Ed., The University of British Columbia, 1978 A- THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES Department of Mathematics and Science Education Faculty of Education We accept this thesis as conforming to the required^tandard @ THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA March 1985 Gaynor Dayson, 1985 In p r e s e n t i n g t h i s t h e s i s i n p a r t i a l f u l f i l m e n t of the requirements f o r an advanced degree at the U n i v e r s i t y o f B r i t i s h Columbia, I agree t h a t the L i b r a r y s h a l l make i t f r e e l y a v a i l a b l e f o r r e f e r e n c e and study. I f u r t h e r agree t h a t p e r m i s s i o n f o r e x t e n s i v e copying of t h i s t h e s i s f o r s c h o l a r l y purposes may be granted by the head o f my department o r by h i s or her r e p r e s e n t a t i v e s . I t i s understood t h a t copying or p u b l i c a t i o n of t h i s t h e s i s f o r f i n a n c i a l gain s h a l l not be allowed without my w r i t t e n p e r m i s s i o n . Department o f The U n i v e r s i t y of B r i t i s h Columbia 1956 Main Mall Vancouver, Canada V6T 1Y3 Date DE-6 (3/81) ABSTRACT This study is concerned with how children interpret the slope of a line graph. Today with the vast accumulations of data which are available from computers, people are being faced with an ever increasing amount of pictorial representation of this data. Therefore i t is of the utmost importance that children understand pic t o r i a l representation. Yet in spite of the popularity of graphs as tools of communication, studies show that many adults experience d i f f i c u l t y in reading information presented in a graphical form. The slope of the graph was chosen for this investigation because i t is in this aspect of graphing (as shown by the results of the 1981 B.C. Assessment) that children in B…
has type: Thesis/Dissertation
is shown at: 10.14288/1.0055021
language: eng
degree discipline: Education
provider: Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
publisher: University of British Columbia
rights: For non-commercial purposes only, such as research, private study and education. Additional conditions apply, see Terms of Use https://open.library.ubc.ca/terms_of_use.
scholar level: Graduate
type: Text
identifier URI: http://hdl.handle.net/2429/25377