This research is a qualitative research that aims to reveal the profile of the ill-structured problem-solving ability of mathematics education collegians to the geometry material based on the level of high and low mathematics ability.

This research method is adapted to its type, that is qualitative research method with explorative approach. The participants of this research consisted of two mathematics education collegians who had studied geometry material identified as high and low mathematics collegians. Both participants  were determined through the results of mathematics ability test. Research data were in the form of interview results of researcher with participants and performed through in-depth, open (overt), and unstructured process.

The results showed that the ill-structured problem solving process of geometry material based on the mathematics ability of mathematics education collegians can determine the quality of their problem solving in five phases of contextualized problem solving by analyzing experiences of ill-structured problem solving. The participants participated in a five-step phase labeled A-B-C-D-E (Analyze-Browse-Create-Decision Making-Evaluate) for ill-structured problem solving.

State of the literature

• Realistic situations relevant to collegian  experiences should be given, and the mathematization of such situations should be materialized through various mathematical activities
• Ill-structured problems, which are contextualized, more interesting and  meaningful to learners, have various solutions or no solution at all, as one or more aspects of the problem situations are not well specified.
• Motivation plays a big role in encouraging collegians to become interested and display the curiosity needed to support increased learning.

Contribution of this paper to the literature

• This study introduces an ill-structured problem solving process followed a five phase model called A-B-C-D-E (Analyze-Browse-Create-Decision-Evaluate)
• In-depth analysis was conducted on the problem solving process depending on level of  mathematics ability of mathematics education collegians to geometry material.

Procedure:

This study was carried out in the following order:

The I-S problem solving process followed a five phase model called A-B-C-D-E for 75 minutes. To help the participants understand the contextualized, complicated and I-S problem situations, first, the participants were asked to analyze and explore a problem situation and then come up with a possible solution during the individual activity. Based on this, problem solving was then.