A STUDY ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF ALGEBRAIC HABITS OF MIND 6th GRADE STUDENTS

According to meb (2013), students first meet algebra in the 6th grade of middle school. this study aims to develop students' algebraic habits in the designed learning environment. to this aim, the algebraic habits of the mind that existed in the students before the application were determined. the course plans prepared to develop these habits were applied in the designed learning environment. afterwards, the developments in students' zcas were analyzed by quantitative and qualitative analyses. the current study adopts an experimental design, with a pre-test-post-test single-group. zca test 1, zca test 2 and focus group interview test were used as data collection tools. with zca test 1, the pre-practise habits of the students were determined, and the developments in the habits of the students after zca test 2 were examined. a detailed thematic analysis of students' zcas was carried out with focus group interview questions. as a result of the analysis, wilcoxon signed sequences test was performed between zca test 1 and 2. as a result of the quantitative analysis, it was concluded that the students developed zca (p = .00, p <.05). in the thematic analysis of the focus group interviews, it was observed that the behaviors of students in doing-undoing and developing the building rules to represent functions had developed in comparison to their pre-practise habits. to conclude, the prepared lesson plan and learning environment were effective in the development of zcas.