THEORETICAL THINKING ON THE CONCEPT OF LIMIT: THE EFFECT OF COMPUTERS

One of the goals of this paper was to analyze 11th grade students' reasoning and knowledge of limits through Sierpinska's model of theoretical thinking (Sierpinska's, 2002). Data were collected from 52 students through a questionnaire. These data revealed that mathematical tasks on limits might be categorized, based on Sierpinska's theory, to reflective, systemic and analytic thinking. The second goal of the study was to examine whether students working with mathematics apple's based on Computer Algebra System (CAS) algebra can improve their performance in reflective, systemic and analytic tasks more than students working in a traditional environment. The analysis showed that students who worked with the mathematics applets improved their performance in analytic tasks.