Prospective Teachers’ Knowledge of Evaluating Student Errors on Area Conservation Task

The data of conjecturing student errors were analyzed by focusing on possible errors of triangle area on a conservation task, while PSTs’ responses of student errors were scrutinized using four strands: mathematical focus, pedagogical action, form of address, and degree of student error use. Results revealed that while PSTs tend to identify as well as interpret the existence of mathematical errors from the conceptual aspect on triangles with the same sizes of height and base, few PSTs could evaluate student errors employing the formal structure of area conservation concept on triangles with the different sizes of height and base. Regarding PST’s responses, PSTs tend to agree with facilitating students to investigate the congruence of base and height of triangles in constructing the concept of triangle area measurement. However, they preferred to choose pedagogical action by reexplaining the main feature of the task solution instead of using student errors as a tool to probe student thinking or provide cognitive conflicts. Furthermore, most of the PST also don’t use student errors as a tool to reconstruct a whole lesson indicating learning trajectory on area conservation concepts, but as a steppingstone to correct subsequent errors.