Virtual manipulatives media in mathematical abstraction

Abstract

By the characteristics of mathematics, which has the object of study is abstract, then the abstraction becomes an important part that can not be separated from mathematics. The development of abstraction theories, either directly or not, will be closely related to the process of learning mathematics in the classroom. Also, the rapid development of virtual manipulatives media in the world of mathematics education can bring a good influence on the learning process that takes place in the classroom. In this regard, this paper aims to examine theories of abstraction in mathematics and its possible implementation in mathematics education which is integrated with virtual manipulatives media to provide a choice to overcome various problems of learning mathematics. In the world of mathematics education, some abstract concepts in mathematics will be more easily learned through empirical abstraction processes such as introducing the concept of positive integers in students. However, when abstract concepts are not allowed to be empirically introduced to the students, the role of virtual manipulatives media can be one of the alternatives to choose from. Also, virtual media manipulatives can be utilized to facilitate the process of reflective abstraction and theoretical abstraction.