Designing and evaluating SIMaV: A conceptual macro-visualization system to enhance students' mathematical abstraction ability

This study aims to develop a design SIMaV conceptual macro-visualization system for linear systems with two variables at the junior high school level and to examine its feasibility and effectiveness in improving students’ mathematical abstraction ability. This research is grounded in the limitations of existing instructional media, which tend to present mathematical concepts through partial or fragmented visualizations that hinder students’ holistic understanding and abstraction processes. To address this gap, SIMaV introduces a novel macro-visualization approach that presents mathematical relationships dynamically and comprehensively, making a new contribution to visualization-based learning in mathematics education. The research method employed was Research and Development (R&D) using the ADDIE model, comprising the analysis, design, development, implementation, and evaluation stages. The research subjects included content experts, media experts, and eighth-grade students. The validation results from content and media experts indicated that the developed medium falls into the “feasible” to “highly feasible” category. Students’ responses to the medium were very positive, as indicated by an average questionnaire score of 3.5 out of 4. In addition, the improvement in students’ abstraction ability was shown by an N-Gain score of 0.63, which is categorized as “moderate.” This medium has proven to help students better understand the concept of linear systems with two variables through its interactive features. Therefore, SIMaV media is suitable for use as an innovation in conceptual macro-visualization systems, particularly for improving students' mathematical abstraction skills.