Conceptual knowledge in area measurement for primary school students: A systematic review

Discussions about teaching area measurement in primary school have been ongoing over some decades. However, investigations that thoroughly examine the current research on conceptual understanding in area measuring in elementary schools are still lacking. The objective of this paper is to review whether conceptual knowledge in area measurement may support students to obtain better results in primary schools. This study is to gain insight into how conceptual knowledge in area measurement has been portrayed for primary school students, and reveal possible omissions and gaps in the synthesized literature on the subject. To gather information, two databases were used: Scopus and Web of Science. Primary searches pulled up many studies on the subject of investigation. After analyzing abstracts and eliminating duplicates, our systematic review indicates that there seems a direct link between conceptual understanding and area measurement in primary school mathematics. Hence, teaching children the principle of area measurement rather than a procedure for solving problems seems to be the most effective way of improving problem-solving skills and conceptual understanding for primary students.