Using knowledge about proof principles for proof validation at secondary school level
Conference contribution (Article) › Research › Peer reviewed
Publication data
| By | Femke Sporn, Daniel Sommerhoff, Aiso Heinze |
| Original language | English |
| Published in | Claudia Cornejo, Patricio Felmer, David M. Gómez, Pablo Dartnell, Paula Araya, Armando Peri, Valeria Randolph (Eds.), Proceedings of the 48th Conference of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education: Research Reports (vol. 2) |
| Pages | 307-314 |
| Editor (Publisher) | PME |
| DOI/Link | https://www.igpme.org/publications/current-proceedings/ |
| Publication status | Published – 07.2025 |
Students are not only expected to construct proofs, but also to be able to check proof validity. So-called proof principles, which can be regarded as a minimal set of criteria for the validity of mathematical proofs, can be used for validation. This study investigated to what extent N = 456 students in grades 8 to 11 know about these proof principles and use this knowledge to validate purported proofs. The results show that most students struggled to identify and correctly evaluate disregarded proof principles in invalid purported proofs. Moreover, many students did not show the knowledge that disregarding these principles logically leads to the invalidity of the purported proof.
The results suggest that secondary school students do not have adequate knowledge about proof principles, which could explain uncertainties in proof validation.
