The relation between prior knowledge and students’ mathematics reflective thinking ability

Abstract

The reflective thinking ability is one of the higher order thinking skills (HOTS), and mathematics reflective thinking is one of the abilities needed in learning mathematics. This study aims to reveal the relation between prior knowledge and mathematics reflective thinking ability which studied by quantitative method. Data collection used instruments of mathematics reflective thinking test. Samples in this study were students of class VIII at junior high school. The results showed that there was a positive relation between prior knowledge and students' mathematics reflective thinking ability with the correlation coefficient 0.49. The regression equation shows that each addition of one prior knowledge score was followed by change in increase in students' mathematics reflective thinking ability by 0.5539. It can be concluded that the prerequisite material as a prior knowledge must be thoroughly learned so as to have a large contribution to the success of learning further material.