Abstract:

Mathematical trails combine mathematical education with the use of mobile devices, increasing interest in mathematics and showing its usefulness in everyday life. The Math City Map mobile application, which enables creation of math trails, was created as a part of the Erasmus + project Mobile Math Trails in Europe. This free application allows mobile devices to display maps, photos of objects related to the tasks of a mathematical trail, as well as assigning individual tasks. The solvers of the math trail seek and then resolve a set of mathematical tasks about real objects found in the outside world. The article is focused on determining the relations between pupils´ attitudes towards mathematics and solving math trails. We would like to find out if the pupils are interested in math trails and whether pupils´ interest in math trails is influenced by their problems in a certain area of mathematics. We also analyze the tasks of math trails in Slovakia in terms of their content, because it is natural to create geometrical tasks as many of the objects we observe in our surroundings are geometrical. During the Week of Science and Technology, we designed and implemented mathematical trails for pupils of 8 graders of an elementary school. The research sample consisted of twenty – six pupils of the eighth grade, 12 girls and 14 boys. After the mathematical trail, pupils answered a short questionnaire, which was focused on their relationship to mathematics and interest in the math trail. Quantitative analysis was done in the research evaluation. The statistical implicative analysis methods, specifically C.H.I.C. statistical software was used for deeper analysis of dependencies between the answers of the questionnaire. We could observe the pupils´ interest in the math trail. A lot of the pupils indicated that mathematical trails are exciting and that they would like to participate in the mathematical trails again. It was also confirmed that there exist some connections between pupils´ interest or disinterest in math trails and their attitudes towards mathematics. The pupils reported that geometry is one of the biggest issues in mathematics lessons, but the most challenging task in the math trail, in their opinion, was a combinatorial task.

Keywords:

Mathematics trail, MCM app, MCM portal, elementary school pupils.