| The emphasis of the study was on how Yemeni use imagery in doing mathematics. Thus a qualitative research design was chosen, which focused on the process rather than isolated events or happenings.;It was decided to interview individually three students of different mathematical sophistication with the intention of examining similarities and differences. With these factors in mind the following students were selected and agreed to take part in the research: (1) Wahee, fourth grade, who was identified as an above average mathematics student. (2) Bayan, fourth grade, who was considered to be a normal grade students. (3) Amin, third grade, who was considered to be weak in mathematics.;In order to gain information about the students' use of imagery while engaged in doing mathematics activities, a variety of tasks were designed as probes during the interviews. Tasks were chosen that had the potential of engaging students mathematically. The same task was not necessarily appropriate for each student. So some tasks were used with particular students while most tasks were used all the students.;Various techniques were used to collect the data. The main strategies included participant observation, and video recordings of participant's solving mathematics activities. Those activities were designed by the researcher with the intention of providing rich opportunities for the use of imagery in mathematics learning. The importance of the activities was the methods they used to solve these problems. Two groups were given voice in this study-participating students and the researcher. In other words both the researcher and the participant had the opportunity to question, assert, and ask for either clarifications or explanations during the interview.;Each participant was interviewed individually 14 times through out the spring and the summer semesters 1997 with each session video recorded.;An analysis of these data showed that being able to compute efficiently is not a good indicator of mathematics competency. The student padge to be weak mathematically performed better than the two students who were supposedly good in mathematics. Amin was able to complete to tasks and solve the problems because he used metal imagery.;A major conclusion of this study is that the use of imagery greatly facilitates doing mathematics. Waheed and Bayan may have been able to use imagery with additional opportunities to develop their spatial ability but their rule orientation rendered them unable to solve non-routine problems.;If we wish to foster mathematics thinking, reasoning and problem solving then is will be necessary that students be given greater opportunity to engaged in spatial activities. These activities encourage the development of spatial sense in students and provide them with means by which they can engage in mathematics as a meaningful enterprise. |
