Mathematics is a tool which almost every human use. Modern people can think practically and independently by the help of it. It is one of the most important instruments serving the objectives of the education as being an operating tool in learning, like the surgeon’s scalpel, and allowing us to penetrate into the inner characteristics of phenomena (Gnedonko and Khalil, 1979).

In learning mathematics, most students seem to interpret their role as essentially acquiring (i.e., memorizing) facts and algorithms that can be immediately applied to the solution of given exercises; few students expect mathematics to be meaningful and fewer still see mathematics as a creative undertaking. Generally, students are faced with externally manipulating symbols and doing routine problems, without ever reaching a deep and personal understanding of the material. Since mathematics consists of abstract concepts, it is hard for students to construct, interpret and visualize the knowledge. Countryman (1992) states that knowing mathematics is doing mathematics. In other words, students need to be active, creative and responsive to the physical world in mathematics class. In order to learn mathematics, they must construct it for themselves by exploring, justifying, representing, discussing, using, describing, investigating, predicting, in short being active in the world. Writing is an ideal activity for such processes (Countryman, 1992; Tosmur, 2004).

Writing activities are beneficial for meaningful understanding, visualization and reinforcement. They are also helpful to develop some mathematical skills such as problem solving, making connections, reasoning and communicating. (MEB, 2008).In other words writing assignments are successful in stimulating some of the higher thinking skills (McCabe, 1994).

Journal writing is one of the most important activities which emphasized nowadays and there are many studies searching the relationships between journal writing and student performance (e.g. Borasi ve Rose, 1989; Davison ve Pierce, 1990; Kasa, 2009; Klishis, 2003; Ntenza, 2006; Sample, 1998; Stack, 1998; Tosmur, 2004).

In this point, the research question is“What are the 8th grade students’ views about journal writing on Surface Area and Volume of Geometric Solids ?

Borasi, R. ve Rose, B.J. (1989). Journal Writing and Mathematics Instruction. Educational Studies in Mathematics, Vol. 20, No. 4 (Nov., 1989), pp. 347-365. Davison, D.M. and Pearce, D.L.: 1990, Perspectives on writing activities in the mathematics classroom, Mathematics Education Research Journal 2(1), 15-22. Kasa, B. (2009). Yazma etkinliklerinin ilköğretim birinci kademe öğrencilerinin matematik başarılarına ve tutumlarına etkisi. Unpublished Master’s Thesis, Pamukkale University, Institute of Social Sciences, Denizli. Klishis, L.A. (2003). The Impact of Student Discourse and Journal Writing on the Mathematics Achievement of Fifth Grade Students, Unpublished Dissertation Thesis, Doctor of education, Department of Curriculum and Instruction, Morgantown, West Virginia. Mc Cabe, D.F. (1994). Writing (and Talking) to learn: Integrating disciplinary content and skills development. Paper included in the proceedings of the eighteenth National Conference On Successfull Colledge Teaching. Orlando, Florida. MEB. (2008). İlköğretim Programı (1-5 Sınıflar), Anı yayıncılık, Ankara Ntenza, S.P. (2006). Investigating Forms of Children's Writing in Grade 7 Mathematics Classrooms. Educational Studies in Mathematics, Vol. 61, No. 3 (Mar., 2006), pp. 321-345 Sample, C.R. (1998). Urban algebra students’ perceptions of journal writing and its effects on achievement with integers and students’ attitudes toward mathematics. Unpublished Dissertation Thesis, Doctor of education, The University of Mississippi. Stack, R.V. (1998). The effects of journal writing on the geometric understanding of preservice elementary teachers. Unpublished Dissertation Thesis, Doctor of education,University of South Dakota. Tosmur,N. (2004). The effect of journal writing on first year engineering students’ achievement on integral. Unpublished Master’s thesis, ODTÜ, Institute ofScience and Technology, Ankara.