Examination of the Estimation Skills and Strategies of Pre-Service Elementary Mathematics Teachers

Abstract

The present study aimed to determine the estimation skills of elementary education pre-service mathematics teachers and the strategies they adopt in estimation. The case study methodology was employed in the study, and the participants included 37 volunteering students attending the fourth grade in the Primary Education Mathematics Instruction Department at a university located in the Central Anatolia Region in Turkey. The study data were collected with an 8-item Estimation Strategy Test developed by the authors. The test included numerosity, computational, and measurement estimation questions. In addition to making estimations, the students were asked to write the reasons behind their estimations. The descriptive analysis technique was employed to analyze the study data, and the data were coded based on the estimation strategies adopted by the pre-service teachers and similarity of their estimations with the actual values. The data are presented as MAXQDA maps, and excerpts from student responses are also presented. The study findings demonstrated that the responses of most pre-service teachers were similar to the actual value in computational estimations; however, numerosity or measurement estimations were not similar. Furthermore, certain pre-service teachers inclined to conduct the actual operation instead of estimating the results during computational estimation, and directly counted the results in numerosity estimation. Also, it was determined that a significant number of pre-service teachers made computational errors in numerosity and computational estimation.