Comparison of foreign and Turkish middle school students' Van Hiele geometric thinking levels and examination of their attitudes towards geometry

The increase in the number of foreign students studying in our country has made the impact of cultural and language differences of these students on their educational processes an important issue. This situation directly affects mathematics instruction and especially geometry teaching. In this study, the geometric thinking levels and attitudes of foreign and Turkish students towards geometry were comparatively examined. The research was carried out with the participation of 127 foreign and 161 Turkish students studying in Kütahya in the spring semester of the 2022-2023 academic year. The Van Hiele Geometric Thinking Test, Geometry Attitude Scale and Personal Information Form were administered. The data were analyzed using the SPSS 22 program. Frequency, percentage, One Way ANOVA, Mann Whitney U test, Kruskal-Wallis test, Fisher's Exact test, Chi-Square test, Independent Sample t-test and correlation analyses were used for the analysis of the data. According to the analysis results, the attitudes of foreign students towards geometry were lower than those of Turkish students. The results of the Van Hiele Geometric Thinking Test show that the geometric thinking levels and mean of foreign students were lower than those of Turkish students. Attitudes towards geometry did not show a significant mean difference in terms of variables such as gender, whether or not they received preschool education, income level and parental education level. In addition, the duration of stay of foreign students in Turkey and whether they attended primary school in Turkey did not have a significant effect on this attitude. When the results of the Van Hiele Geometric Thinking Test were examined, the levels and mean of foreign and Turkish students did not show a significant mean difference in terms of gender, preschool education, income level and mother's education level. However, the levels and mean of Turkish students showed a significant mean difference according to the level of education of the father, and as the level of education of the father increased, the geometric thinking levels and mean of the students also increased. The levels and mean of foreign students did not show a significant mean difference according to the duration of stay in Turkey and whether they attended primary school in Turkey. The findings of this study will contribute to the development of more effective geometry teaching strategies for foreign students by revealing the relationships between Van Hiele geometric thinking levels and attitudes towards geometry.