How the novelty of students' answers in solving mathematical problems?

The impact of giving a thinking freedom opportunity is the diversity of students' answers in solving mathematical problems. The smaller the similarity of students' answers compared to all the answers of students in a class, it means that they have higher creative thinking abilities than other students. It is based on a unique answer compared to the others or in other words it has a higher novelty value than the other answers. The objective of this study was to describe the attainment of the novelty of students' answers in solving mathematical problems. The measurement of novelty of students' answers was carried out on 1,002 students from six junior high schools in Indonesia who had different levels of student's input. The scoring system on the response to the completion of multiple solution tasks was by using the four categories of polytomous in which it is based on the Partial Credit Model (PCM). The data were analyzed by using Quest and Parscale program. The result of this study showed that the students have good skills in solving mathematical problems with new ideas on several items. The items referred to some abilities, such as resolving algebra problems involving money operations, designing a flat shape that has specific characteristics, arranging numbers based on certain patterns, and arranging numbers based on certain patterns. The novelty of this research is that this study considers every answer from students or provides a thinking freedom opportunity for students so that mathematical problems are not absolutely solved with one answer.