IMPROVING OF STUDENTS MATHEMATICAL REASONING ABILITY BY APPLYING REALISTIC MATHEMATICS EDUCATION (RME) ON APPROACH SUBJECT SETS IN VII GRADE SMP NEGERI 1 BINJAI ACADEMIC YEAR 2013/2014

The aim of this research is to improve students’ mathematic reasoning in class VII
SMP Negeri 1 Binjai in Sets topic by using realistic mathematic education.
Subject on this research is students in class VII-7 SMP which total students is 36
students and object this research is process and learning outcomes in improvement
of mathematic reasoning ability through realistic mathematic education.
Instrument of this research are observation, interview, and test. This research is
Class Action Research (CAR) which is divided into 2 cycles, This research had
done in two cycles which each cycle had two meetings and the end of each
meeting was given mathematical reasoning ability test. Initial test is given to
students before teacher give learning to students. From cycle I, the average score
of mathematics reasoning test I 67,90 and there are 24 students of 36 students
individually accomplished and classically mastery learning is 67%, this shows
that students’ reasoning ability still low. In implementation of cycle II from score
of mathematic reasoning test II got the average score of mathematic reasoning test
II is 75,16 and classically mastery learning has achieved 89% or 32 students has
completed the learning individually. Based on this research result is obtained that
learning by using realistic mathematic education in the topic of sets in SMP
Negeri 1 Binjai can improve students’ mathematic reasoning. Based on criteria of
classical mastery learning then this learning has achieved the targer of mastery
learning. The improvement can be concluded that through realistic learning, the
mathematic reasoning ability in sets topic in class VII SMP Negeri 1 Binjai has
improved. The suggestion which is recommended that teacher able to
implemented the realistic mathematic education as alternative in learning process
which can improve the students reasoning ability.