Investigation of primary mathematics pre-service teachers' pedagogi̇cal content knowledge concerning the concept of ratio and proportion in the context of students' errors

The aim of this study is to examine the pedagogical content knowledge of prospective elementary mathematics teachers regarding the topic of ratio and proportion. The component of pedagogical content knowledge under investigation is the knowledge of understanding students. In the study, an exploratory design, one of the mixed research methods, was adopted. The study group consists of 118 prospective teachers studying in the third and fourth grades of the Elementary Mathematics Teaching program at Balıkesir University Necatibey Faculty of Education during the 2023-2024 academic year. The participants were selected using the deviant case sampling method, which is one of the non-random sampling methods. To determine the pedagogical content knowledge of the prospective teachers, the Ratio and Proportion Student Understanding Knowledge Scale was used. The data obtained from the scale were analyzed using content analysis, descriptive analysis, frequency and percentage values, and ANOVA test. Additionally, direct details regarding the opinions were included. At the end of the study, it was determined that the prospective teachers' knowledge of understanding students in the context of ratio and proportion was not at a sufficient level. Furthermore, it was found that there was no significant difference between the class level of the prospective teachers and their knowledge of understanding students.