MINDA: A cognitive tool for fraction word problems solving

Abstract

Word problem solving is one of the most challenging tasks in mathematics for most students. It requires the solver to translate the problem into the language of mathematics. From a study conducted on Malaysian school students, it was found that majority of them has poor mathematical communication skills. Both communication skills namely the intrapersonal and interpersonal communications are significant to the cognitive processes of the problem solver. It is therefore the main aim of this paper is to present MINDA, a cognitive tool for fraction word problem solving designed based on the Cognitive-Communicative (C-C) model. MINDA adopts the two approaches namely computer-as-tool and computer-as-tutor approach. An experimental study was carried out to test MINDA. The result of the study shows that there is a significant difference in the achievement of the experimental group and the control group for both the above-overage and below average students.