Introduction to the concept of volume in the middle school level: A sample teaching with concrete material support

The purpose of this study is to present a new teaching environment enriched with concrete materials used in daily life based on experiment and observation on the concept of volume gained at the sixth grade level for the first time in the field of geometry and measurement learning in the curriculum of secondary school mathematics and to evaluate this environment from different perspectives. Qualitative research method has been adopted in collection, analysis and interpretation of data in the research. The research was carried out with a total of seven students, four of whom were female and three were male who were educated in a public school in Eskişehir' in 2016-2017 academic year. In addition, students were given a written application consisting of 10 open-ended questions developed by the researcher. During the teaching process data were collected through observations made by the researcher, clinical interviews with the students and written application. After analyzing the data, it was observed that mathematical lessons were given to the students by giving the volume formula and more conceptual knowledge was put into the background. By establishing interdisciplinary links based on experiments, it has been concluded that providing instructional environments supported by concrete materials used in daily life is effective in teaching the concept of volume.