A Comparative Study Of The Partial Difficulty Of Functions In Chinese And American Junior Mathematics Textbooks

Function content is the main part of mathematics teaching,it is a difficult point for junior high school students in mathematics learning,but also a preliminary embodiment of the idea of combining numbers and shapes.As the main course content in the textbook,the function knowledge can’t be underestimated to support the mathematics education and the students’ subsequent development.China and the United States are the representatives of China and Western countries,but due to the differences in culture and education concepts,the content of functions in the course differs greatly.Therefore,the comparison of the content and difficulty of functions in Chinese and American junior middle school mathematics textbooks can be used as reference for domestic education.Against this background,this paper selects the function contents of the seventh to ninth grades of the Compulsory Education Textbook Mathematics(hereinafter referred to as the "PEP")and Glencoe Math(Coursel-3)(hereinafter referred to as the "GM version")published by Mc Graw-Hill Publishing House in 2012 as the main research objects,and obtains the course difficulty data of the function contents of the two editions of the textbook by using different research methods such as literature analysis,content analysis,comparative analysis and statistical analysis.In the analysis of exercise difficulty,we assign value to five difficult factors,such as inquiry,background,operation,inference and knowledge content,and calculate the weighted average value of five difficult factors.The results show that: 1.The curriculum time of function content in PEP and GM editions is 37 and 31 respectively,and the evaluation values of curriculum time are 1.000 and 0.838 respectively.PEP section arrangement is closer,GM version of the function of the knowledge points in the middle school of all grades are uniform,balanced time distribution.2.The curriculum breadth evaluation values of the PEP Edition and GM are 0.909 and 0.303 respectively,and the curriculum depth evaluation values are 0.318 and 0.300 respectively.The PEP Edition involves more knowledge content and requires higher acceptance of knowledge points than the GM Edition.3.On the difficulty of exercises,the evaluation values of the difficulty of exercises in PEP and GM editions are 0.506 and 0.453 respectively,and the difficulty of exercises in PEP is more difficult.4.From the model of curriculum difficulty,the value of curriculum difficulty of the two editions of textbooks is 0.6108 and 0.4142 respectively,and the textbook of the PEP is more difficult.Based on the above research,the following suggestions are put forward: First,the content of the function is refined.Second,add "pre-chapter detection" or "knowledge review" module to strengthen the connection between new and old knowledge;third,integrate the teaching materials with local culture;fourth,pay attention to the teaching of plane rectangular coordinate system to strengthen the connection of knowledge;fifth,reasonably develop and use the teaching materials.