Digital technology in mathematics education: Why it works (or doesn't)

The integration of digital technology confronts teachers, educators and researchers with many questions. What is the potential of ICT for learning and teaching, and which factors are decisive in making it work in the mathematics classroom? To investigate these questions, six cases from leading studies in the field are described, and decisive success factors are identified. This leads to the conclusion that crucial factors for the success of digital technology in mathematics education include the design of the digital tool and corresponding tasks exploiting the tool's pedagogical potential, the role of the teacher and the educational context

Overview of modern teaching equipment that supports distant learning

Laboratory is a key element of engineering and applied sciences educational systems. With the development of Internet and connecting IT technologies, the appearance of remote laboratories was inevitable. Virtual laboratories are also available; they place the experiment in a simulated environment. However, this writing focuses on remote experiments not virtual ones. From the students’ point of view, it is a great help not only for those enrolling in distant or online courses but also for those studying in a more traditional way. With the spread of smart, portable devices capable of connection to the internet, students can expand or restructure time spent on studying. This is a huge help to them and also allows them to individually divide their time up, to learn how to self-study. This independent approach can prepare them for working environments. It offers flexibility and convenience to the students. From the universities’ point of view, it helps reduce maintenance costs and universities can share experiments which also helps the not so well-resourced educational facilities

La tecnología digital en educación matemática: por qué funciona (o no)

The integration of digital technology confronts teachers, educators and researchers with many questions. What is the potential of ICT for learning and teaching, and which factors are decisive in making it work in the mathematics classroom? To investigate these questions, six cases from leading studies in the field are described, and decisive success factors are identified. This leads to the conclusion that crucial factors for the success of digital technology in mathematics education include the design of the digital tool and corresponding tasks exploiting the tool’s pedagogical potential, the role of the teacher and the educational context.La integración de la tecnología digital enfrenta a profesores, formado-res de profesores e investigadores a muchas preguntas. ¿Cuál es el po-tencial de las TIC en el aprendizaje y la enseñanza, y qué factores son determinantes al trabajar en clase de matemáticas? Para investigar es-tas cuestiones, se describen seis casos de estudio prominentes en el área, y se identifican los factores decisivos para el éxito. Esto lleva a la conclusión de que los factores cruciales para el éxito de la tecnología digital en la educación matemática incluyen el diseño de la herramienta digital y de las tareas apropiadas que exploren el potencial pedagógico de la herramienta, el papel del profesor y el contexto educativo

Digital Simulations for Grade 7 to 10 Mathematics

This article describes a Department of Science and Technology – Philippine Council for Industry, Energy and Emerging Technology (DOST-PCIEERD) project aimed to facilitate the implementation of the mathematical objectives raised by the Department of Education’s (DepEd) K to 12 program in the Philippines through the use of innovative digital technologies. In particular, a selection of application software (“apps”) were created for Grade 7 to 10 mathematics that covered topics indicated in the five strands outlined in the K to 12 program – namely (1) number, (2) geometry, (3) measurement, (4) patterns and algebra, and (5) statistics and probability. The design of the apps was informed by an amalgamated framework of the Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning (Mayer 2005) and Mathematical Theories of Representation (Goldin 1998). The design was informed by how students learn and how students learn mathematics. The project also aimed to design manipulable software that allows learners to construct and grapple with their mental representations of mathematical concepts. This paper describes a selection of the apps designed by the project and how their features were informed by the theoretical framework. It also presents results from pilot studies that demonstrate the apps’ potential to increase performance, facilitate conceptual development, and increase learners’ engagement

Teaching Visually Impaired College Students in Introductory Statistics

Instructors of postsecondary classes in statistics rely heavily on visuals in their teaching, both within the classroom and in resources like textbooks, handouts, and software, but this information is often inaccessible to students who are blind or visually impaired (BVI). The unique challenges involved in adapting both pedagogy and course materials to accommodate a BVI student may provoke anxiety among instructors teaching a BVI student for the first time, and instructors may end up feeling unprepared or “reinventing the wheel.” We discuss a wide variety of accommodations inside and outside of the classroom grounded in the empirical literature on cognition and learning and informed by our own experience teaching a blind student in an introductory statistics course

Architecting Multimedia Environments for Teaching

A lthough surrounded by today's many technological enhancements, teachers remain utterly alone in front of their classes. Even in 2005, most teachers still rely on well-established primitive aids. For example, the chalkboard-one of history's earliest teaching tools-remains the preferred exposition medium in many scientific disciplines. Since the advent of computational devices in education, researchers have sought the means for properly integrating them and taking advantage of their capabilities. The difficult task of architecting multimedia environments for teaching must start with a needs analysis. The most challenging task involves warranting reliability on the one hand, while accommodating opportunities for innovation on the other. Thus, we propose building a reliable, ubiquitous, adaptable, and easy-to-use technology-integrating black box. Placing this system atop a service-oriented component model implemented on a platform-independent layer such as a virtual machine will provide the adaptability developers need. Loosely coupled components will accommodate a nonmonolithic approach and ease reuse. By reusing and enhancing components, the system will become increasingly reliable, while a building-block architecture will keep it manageable. WHAT TEACHERS HAVE The demand for computational equipment to use in education is surging. Several partial solutions already exist, but no one so far has put forth a global vision for using this technology. Nor have researchers devoted much effort to developing architectures that can combine technologies focused on the classroom with easily used designs. To date, three e-learning approaches predominate: • intensive use of slide show presentations; • video recording lectures transmitted via fiber optics and, more recently, Internet broadcasting; and • the creation of e-learning modules such as dynamic Web pages, flash animations, or Java applets. Slide show presentations enable good visualization and smooth lecture performance. The instructor plans the presentation's structure up front, taking into account all required resources. Visual elements such as tables, diagrams, or images can be directly presented to the audience. Further, computer-generated slides can be printed out so that students don't need to copy the content for later review. However, slide show presentations often appear static because everything must be planned in advance, leaving few possibilities for the teacher to adapt the content in interaction with the students. Usually, slides present content in note form, structured as bullet-point lists, which dramatically restricts the lecturer's freedom of expression. Often, the instructor must deliver information out-of-band Thus far, developers have created only partial solutions for using computational equipment in education. Research must focus more effort on developing architectures capable of combining technologies that target the classroom and that allow specifying "what" rather than "how" tasks should be done

Mobile and web tools for participative learning

Dissertação apresentada na Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, para a obtenção do grau de Mestre em Engenharia InformáticaThe combination of different media formats has been a crucial aspect on teaching and learning processes. The recent developments of multimedia technologies over the Internet and using mobile devices can improve the communication between professors and students, and allow students to study anywhere and anytime, allowing each student progress at its own pace. The usage of these new platforms and the increase of multimedia sharing applied to educational environments allow a more participative learning, and make the study of interfaces a relevant aspect of existing multimedia learning systems. The work done in this dissertation explores interfaces and tools for participative learning,using multimedia educational systems over Internet broadband and mobile devices. In this work, aWeb-based learning system was developed, which enables to store, transmit, search and share the contents of courses captured in video and its extension to support Tablet PCs. The Web system, developed as part of the VideoStore project, explores video interfaces and video annotations, which encourage the participative work. The usage of Tablet PCs, through the mEmLearn project, has the aim to encourage the participative work, allowing the students to augment the course materials and to share them with other students or instructors

A basic web-based distance education model

Thesis (Master)--Izmir Institute of Technology, Computer Engineering, Izmir, 2005Includes bibliographical references (leaves: 147)Text in English; Abstract: Turkish and Englishxv, 201 leavesDuring the recent years, the rapid growth of the Web and multimedia technologies urged a shift of Computer-Based Educational Technology towards the Web. In the leading universities of the developed countries, studies on Web-Based Education have started and in an increasing manner are going strong. In the last few years, the leading universities of Turkey are also greatly interested in Web-Based Education and have started their re-structuring accordingly.The goal of this study is to design a basic model to be utilized by a university aiming to offer web-based distance education. In achieving this; by the use of system approach, a model comprising of three subsystems, namely system analysis, system design and evaluation&control, working in coordination with each other, has been tried to be proposed. There may be only one missing point of this study, that is; since preparing a lesson or program according to this model was not foreseen in this thesis, the effectiveness evaluations suggested in the evaluation&control subsystem could not be realized. It is recommended to realize such an evaluation in a further study to make it possible to reveal the effectiveness of web-based education by preparing a lesson or program according to this model.On the other hand, a survey has been conducted in Turkey in some of the universities either offering web-based education or are interested in studies in this field.The aim of this survey is to analyze from system design point of view the studies carried out in our universities on this matter and to get a picture of the existing situation.The directed questions aiming this were prepared by taking into consideration of the three stages of system design subsystem, i.e. administrative design, educational design, and technological design. It is intended for the result of this survey to shed light to the new-coming institutions in this field. As a matter of fact, each stage of this subsystem is a survey item itself and should be researched one by one in other studies.Furthermore, for individuals interested in distance education and web-based distance education and for people newly involved in this matter, this thesis is intended to be a reference material and to serve this purpose the sections are prepared containing the basic information accordingly. Nevertheless, since most of the information regarding system design are prepared without taking into consideration the disabled people, the relevant information are not complete. In another study, the offering of the web-based education to the disabled people, especially for deaf, hard of hearing or speech impaired, and blind students, has to be investigated.Finally, in this thesis the proposed model for the Web-Based Distance Education, as being a basic and conceptual model, has a flexible structure; i.e., suitable for all the institutions and establishments intending to offer the web-based education.What is important here, is to exploit the potential sources within the institution that will display the required systematic approach