Realistic mathematics education (RME) was developed in Netherlands,
it’s a program that used to teach mathematics in new way, which implements
bottom-up strategy and links to the realistic problems around human’s life. RME
has been used not only in Netherlands, but also in USA, and it showed a
positive result to the students. RME itself is taught to the primary school
because the students in primary school have to understand mathematics clearly.
We have to implant that mathematics is not an abstract thing, so we have to
teach them relate to our daily life, so that they will understand and use
mathematics to solve their problems in real life.
Indonesia adopted RME to be implemented to teach mathematics, which is
called Pendidikan Matematika Realistik Indonesia (PMRI). Indonesian government
has built cooperation with Netherlands government since 2000. They want to show
that mathematics is for everyone because everyone needs it, not only in the classroom,
but also in every part of life such as in the home, in the office, in the road,
in the market, even in worship place. By implementing PMRI, mathematics will
much easier to be learned.
For example, in the 3rd grade of SD Percobaan, Yogyakarta,
one of teacher has implemented PMRI. By using a crate of empty bottles, he
taught multiplication. He started by showing the crate to the students, then he
asked the students to draw the crate. The crate itself contains 24 bottles (4
bottles for its length and 6 bottles for its width). After the students drew
the crate, then their picture were not same, then the teacher explained either
4x6 or 6x4 is an international language, so in every country 4x6 and 6x4 will
has the same result which is 24.
After that, the teacher asked the students to observe the classroom
and find some things that have the similar structure like the crate. The
students found that the floor, the roof, and many things, then they learn to
apply the multiplication in the crate to those things. Also, the students found
another thing which has the similar structure in the school yard, in their way
to go home, and it makes them realize that the so many application of the
multiplication in the world. So, it’s one of the examples of the RME that has been
implemented in Yogyakarta.
Some of the characteristics of RME are:
1.
Started from the context in real life. It means that by starting from
the real problem, makes the students aware of their environment, the things
around them.
2.
Linked to the other subjects. It shows that mathematics is applicable
for every single part of our life.
3.
Based on experience. People say “experience is the best teacher,” then
by learning from pur experience, it hopes we can learn something new and
better.
4.
Started from bottom to the top (bottom – top strategy). It’s like
hiking the mountain, step-by-step to go to the top, and then we will learn many
things in the steps themselves.
5.
Cooperation and discussion. By discussing with the friends, they will learn
to think the problem from the other perspectives.
6.
Different strategy, different answer. Everyone has his/her own
thought; just let the students explore their own thinking and then grab the
conclusion.
7.
Meaningful. That’s why RME should relate to the real life, if learning
math abstractly, it could be meaningless.
8.
Students’ activities. In conventional teaching, the students are
passive, they only sit, listen, see, then write. However, RME let the students
to have activities as a part of learning.
Bottom-up strategy is like hiking the mountain, why? Because the
result or the indicators are located in the top as our target, meanwhile the
processes of learning are the students’ experiences to reach the top itself,
and of course in the bottom of the mountain or the starting point is our part
to introduce the material by using problems, or many things.
Let’s compare the “bottom-up” strategy with “top-down” strategy which
often used by the teachers. Top-down strategy means the teachers give the
result of the problem, or solve the problem by himself, and then asks the
students to do the same thing as he did. It is kind a conventional way, the
teachers give the problem, then solve it in front of the classroom, and then
ask the students whether they understand or not, after that ask them to do exercises
in the textbook. So, from this perspective, “bottom-up” strategy is better than
“top-down” strategy.
All in all, in Indonesia, RME not only provides a new approach to
teach mathematics, but also a new way of thinking to the students. By introducing
real life problem, it hopes the students can understand and apply mathematics
properly, and decreases the number of the students that hate mathematics or
mathphobia. Mathematics is a queen of science, without mathematics, we cannot
survive in the world. So, let’s bring mathematics to the students as the future
leader to build our nations better someday.
