Use of Letters as a Source of Errors for University Students in Solving Algebraic Tasks

The present investigation is a study with 194 students of the Centro Universitario de la Costa Sur in Autlan, Mexico. It aims to analyze the most common mistakes that first semester students show in the productions, to operate with different meanings that may have letters in algebra and, based on these results, establish its location within one of the four categories of understanding in the use and meaning of letters in algebra proposed by Küchemann (1980). The results show that more than half of the students at this level of education do not show difficulties in evaluating letters, handling them as objects or considering their presence, however, it does reveal deficiencies in the discernment to understand the use and meaning of the letters as unknown of specific value, numbers, and variables such as widespread.

Errors; Algebraic Tasks; Uses of Letters; Levels of Understanding; University Students