Abstract

• The main purpose of this study is to assess a concept attainment model in middle school mathematics teaching. Both quantitative and qualitative research methods were used in this study. Quantitative research method was used to analyze students’ mathematics achievement and mathematics process skills. Qualitative research method was used to investigate attitudes of teachers towards the attainment of mathematics concepts and the proposed concept attainment model, and those of students towards mathematics learning through learning activities based on the proposed concept attainment model. For quantitative research, an experimental study was conducted. One of the quasi-experimental designs, viz., the nonequivalent control group design, was used in this study. The subjects were randomly selected from Grade Seven in BEHS Phado, BEHS (Branch) Quarter (2) Phado, BEHS (Branch) Myoe Chaung, BEHS Myoe Ma, BEHS (Branch) Hnget Thike, and BEHS (Branch) La-Ka-Ya 3. There were (581) Grade Seven students in the experiment. For qualitative research, the students who participated in the experimental groups and the teachers who taught the experimental groups were randomly selected. The instruments used in this study were pretest, posttest, questionnaire, and interview. Learning materials for this study were selected from Grade Seven mathematics textbook, Volume 2. According to the pilot testing, the internal consistency of pretest question was 0.782. The data were analyzed by using independent samples t test and one-way analysis of covariance (One-Way ANCOVA). According to results, differences in mathematics achievement and mathematics process skills were significantly found between the two selected groups. The qualitative data also supported the findings from the quantitative study. Finally, research findings proved that the proposed concept attainment model has positive contribution to middle school mathematics teaching.