إستراتيجية مقترحة لرفع مستوى مهارات التمثيل الجبري والهندسي للمسائل الرياضية اللفظية وحلها لدى طلاب الصف الثامن الأساسي في منطقة الظاهرة بسلطنة عمان
The aim of the current research is to find out the results of a proposed teaching strategy to raise the skill level of eighth grade students in relation to algebraic and geometric representation of verbal mathematical problems and their solution. The proposed strategy consisted of five phases: 1) The stage of understanding the verbal problem. 2) The stage of representation. 3) The stage of proposing a solution plan. 4) The stage of implementing the plan. 5) The stage of evaluating the solution plan. Eight schools were chosen randomly from among the schools of the General Directorate of Education in Al Dhahirah region in the academic year (2007/2008) and the selected schools covered all the states of Al Dhahirah region, where four schools were chosen to represent the experimental group, and the other four to represent the group. The control group, and the experimental group consisted of (99) male and female students, while the control group consisted of (106) male and female students, noting that the size of the research community (the number of male and female students of the eighth grade for the academic year 2007/2008 AD) amounted to (3212) male and female students, including (1652) male students. And (1560) female students. For research purposes, the researcher used the following tools: 1) Two diagnostic tests in the units "Geometry" and "Functions and Equations": to identify the reality of students' skills in representing and solving verbal problems. 2) A questionnaire directed to the supervisors and teachers of mathematics for the eighth grade to identify the reasons for the weak skills of representation and solution of verbal problems. 3) Verbal problem representation and solving skills tests, which are divided into: a) Skills tests for representing and solving verbal engineering problems. b) Examination of skills of representation and solution of verbal algebraic problems. The results of the research showed the distinction of the group of students who studied according to the proposed strategy compared to the students who studied in the usual way in the skills of representation and solution of geometric and algebraic problems, as this appeared in the results of the tests of skills of representation and solution of verbal problems of the five skills separately and in their results together. The female group outperformed the male group in the two skills of comprehension, geometric representation of verbal engineering issues and the results of tests for the five skills together, while there were no statistically significant differences between males and females in the rest of the skills. The female group also outperformed the male group in the five skills (understanding skills, algebraic representation, proposing a solution plan for verbal algebraic problems, implementing and evaluating them), as well as for the results of the tests for the five skills together, and the measurement of the impact of the proposed strategy supported the research results, where the strength of the impact of the strategy was great on all the skills of representing and solving verbal geometric problems and all the skills of representing and solving verbal algebraic problems, from analyzing the results of students' performance in each of the tests of skills of representing and solving verbal geometric and algebraic problems. In light of the results that were reached in this research, the researcher recommended a set of recommendations, including but not limited to the following: 1) Benefiting from the classification of algebraic and geometric representation skills for verbal problems and their solution in mathematics teaching, and designing activities that focus on raising the level of the partial skills that make up the five basic skills that the research focused on. 2) Benefiting from the reality of students' skills with regard to representing verbal problems and solving them as revealed by the results of diagnostic tests by curriculum developers in the Sultanate to give more care and attention to verbal issues and focus on them in various subjects of the curriculum. In light of the topic of the research and its results, it raised new questions that emerged from it that may be worthy of research and study. Therefore, the researcher suggests the following: 1) Conducting similar research to the current research in other branches of mathematics. 2) Studying the effect of using other teaching strategies on raising the level of skills for representing and solving verbal problems. 3) Designing a program to develop the skills of representing and solving verbal problems. (Published abstract)