Technology Solutions for Developmental Math: An Overview of Current and Emerging Practices

Reviews current practices in and strategies for incorporating innovative technology into the teaching of remedial math at the college level. Outlines challenges, emerging trends, and ways to combine technology with new concepts of instructional strategy

An eMath Teacher TOOL for ACTIVE LEARNING FLEURY'S ALGORITHM

An eMathTeacher [Sánchez-Torrubia 2007a] is an eLearning on line self assessment tool that help students to active learning math algorithms by themselves, correcting their mistakes and providing them with clues to find the right solution. The tool presented in this paper is an example of this new concept on Computer Aided Instruction (CAI) resources and has been implemented as a Java applet and designed as an auxiliary instrument for both classroom teaching and individual practicing of Fleury’s algorithm. This tool, included within a set of eMathTeacher tools, has been designed as educational complement of Graph Algorithm active learning for first course students. Its characteristics of visualization, simplicity and interactivity, make this tutorial a great value pedagogical instrument

Reading and Math Interventions at the Secondary Level: A Research Brief

Starting in the early 2000’s with the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) act, federal and state education authorities promoted the use of accountability policies that require schools to meet certain measures of academic progress overtime. Annual Yearly Progress (AYP) and Annual Measurable Objectives (AMOs) have become the new measure of school success. These policies rely heavily on students’ Math and Reading achievement at particular benchmark grades, leading local educational agencies (i.e. school divisions) to place increased emphasis on the reading and math results of state-mandated testing. In Virginia, pressures to meet AYP and AMOs by improving school performance on the Standards of Learning assessments – especially in academically underperforming schools – has to led to the adoption of various reading and math interventions designed to support student learning. While there is some broadening of school success criteria in the newly authorized Every Student Succeeds Education Act, it is likely that achievement in math and reading will still be a top priority in our education system. Therefore, even amidst changing policy, the importance of identifying and implementing effective interventions still exists. At the secondary level, reading and math interventions play a unique role in student achievement. While there may be students that struggle with math and reading at the secondary level, in most cases secondary course work has moved beyond these basic skills. For example, high school English classes are literature-based, and the teachers at this level are not trained to teach reading skills. For this reason, many local school divisions have had to develop interventions that restructure the form and the content of the curriculum, and draw on new resources for addressing these needs. Strategies include increasing instructional time in math and reading, integrating math and reading skills across the curriculum, and purchasing off the shelf curriculums, many of which are computer based. However, while the implementation of interventions has been widely accepted, some ambiguity still exists around which programs are most effective for school divisions to implement with their students1 . With hundreds of reading and math interventions available to school divisions, it can be challenging to select the most appropriate intervention for local schools. As a result, divisions often adopt multiple interventions that can sometimes appear to be fragmented. In accordance with the Regulations Establishing Accrediting Standards for Public Schools in Virginia (SOA), the Virginia Board of Education has published a list of recommended instructional interventions. While this list is beneficial, it still provides school divisions with a potentially overwhelming number of intervention options and provides little evidence that demonstrate their efficacy.1 As a result, school divisions are left to do their own research to decide which option is most appropriate to implement with their students

Educational Technology Topic Guide

This guide aims to contribute to what we know about the relationship between educational technology (edtech) and educational outcomes by addressing the following overarching question: What is the evidence that the use of edtech, by teachers or students, impacts teaching and learning practices, or learning outcomes? It also offers recommendations to support advisors to strengthen the design, implementation and evaluation of programmes that use edtech. We define edtech as the use of digital or electronic technologies and materials to support teaching and learning. Recognising that technology alone does not enhance learning, evaluations must also consider how programmes are designed and implemented, how teachers are supported, how communities are developed and how outcomes are measured (see http://tel.ac.uk/about-3/, 2014). Effective edtech programmes are characterised by: a clear and specific curriculum focus the use of relevant curriculum materials a focus on teacher development and pedagogy evaluation mechanisms that go beyond outputs. These findings come from a wide range of technology use including: interactive radio instruction (IRI) classroom audio or video resources accessed via teachers’ mobile phones student tablets and eReaders computer-assisted learning (CAL) to supplement classroom teaching. However, there are also examples of large-scale investment in edtech – particularly computers for student use – that produce limited educational outcomes. We need to know more about: how to support teachers to develop appropriate, relevant practices using edtech how such practices are enacted in schools, and what factors contribute to or mitigate against successful outcomes. Recommendations: 1. Edtech programmes should focus on enabling educational change, not delivering technology. In doing so, programmes should provide adequate support for teachers and aim to capture changes in teaching practice and learning outcomes in evaluation. 2. Advisors should support proposals that further develop successful practices or that address gaps in evidence and understanding. 3. Advisors should discourage proposals that have an emphasis on technology over education, weak programmatic support or poor evaluation. 4. In design and evaluation, value-for-money metrics and cost-effectiveness analyses should be carried out

Technology’s edge: the educational benefits of computer-aided instruction

Because a significant portion of U.S. students lacks critical mathematic skills, schools across the country are investing heavily in computerized curriculums as a way to enhance education output, even though there is surprisingly little evidence that they actually improve student achievement. In this paper we present results from a randomized study in three urban school districts of a well- defined use of computers in schools: a popular instructional computer program which is designed to teach pre-algebra and algebra. We assess the impact of the program using statewide tests that cover a range of math skills and tests designed specifically to target pre- algebra and algebra skills. We find that students randomly assigned to computer-aided instruction score at least 0.17 of a standard deviation higher on a pre- algebra/algebra test than students randomly assigned to traditional instruction. We hypothesize that the effectiveness arises from increased individualized instruction as the effects appear larger for students in larger classes and those in classes in which students are frequently absent.Computer-assisted instruction ; Technology

Evaluating Digital Math Tools in the Field

Many school districts have adopted digital tools to supplement or replace teacher-led instruction, usually based on the premise that these tools can provide more personalized or individualized experiences for students and at lower cost. Rigorously evaluating whether such initiatives promote better student outcomes in the field is difficult as most schools and teachers are unwilling to enforce rigorous study designs such as randomized control trials. We used study designs that were feasible in practice to assess whether two digital math tools, eSpark and IXL, were associated with improvements in 3rd – 6th grade student test scores in math. We also investigated the resource requirements and costs of implementing eSpark and IXL to assess whether these tools represent a valuable use of resources. We find that while IXL is substantially less costly to implement than eSpark, its use is not significantly associated with students’ math performance

Cognitive and affective perspectives on immersive technology in education

This research explains the rationale behind the utilization of mobile learning technologies. It involves a qualitative study among children to better understand their opinions and perceptions toward the use of educational applications (apps) that are available on their mobile devices, including smartphones and tablets. The researchers organized semi-structured, face-to-face interview sessions with primary school students who were using mobile technologies at their primary school. The students reported that their engagement with the educational apps has improved their competencies. They acquired relational and communicative skills as they collaborated in teams. On the other hand, there were a few students who were not perceiving the usefulness and the ease of use of the educational apps on their mobile device. This study indicates that the research participants had different skillsets as they exhibited different learning abilities. In conclusion, this contribution opens-up avenues for future research in this promising field of study.peer-reviewe

Classworks as a Means to Gaining Equity in the General Education Math Classroom: Perceptions of Students Receiving Special Education Services

With the importance of math steadily increasing, researchers in the field of special education have made efforts to increase the performance of students with disabilities (Fuchs et al., 2008; Gersten, Jordan, & Flojo, 2005). Despite the deficits these students face, the trend has been for many years that most students with disabilities in math receive their instruction in the general education classroom. The purpose of this study was to examine the perceptions that students receiving special education services have regarding the effectiveness of Classworks, a computer-assisted instructional program, in helping them gain equity in the general education math classroom. Critical Disability Theory (CDT) provided the theoretical framework for the study. One of the elements important to CDT is giving voice to persons with disabilities. Traditionally, the voices of persons with disabilities have been suppressed and marginalized when the person speaks out against the mainstream views of disability. CDT allows the voices of persons with disabilities to be heard and valued. Critical Pedagogy was a second theoretical framework for this study. Critical Pedagogy seeks to end the oppression and marginalization of specific groups of students. The researcher explored students; perspectives of Classworks through individual interviews and group observations. This study found that students viewed Classworks as an effective method of improving computational math skills. Students appreciated the immediate feedback and self-paced environment that Classworks provided and reported that these features gave them more confidence in their math skills. Students also reported, however, that these features were not available to them in the general education classroom, causing them to fall behind their peers. Classworks also does not provide advanced problem-solving lessons to prepare students for the rigorous problems that the math curriculum requires them to solve. From this study, it can be concluded that Classworks provides many elements that can lead to greater access to the general education mathematics curriculum. However, while Classworks’ focus on computational skills supports students’ learning of basic mathematical knowledge, there was little evidence to support students’ ability to generalize those skills to similar problems encountered in the general education curricula

Investing In Results: How Business Roundtable Is Supporting Proven Education Reforms

The CEO effort to expand on what's working started in 2013 when Business Roundtable launched its Education Philanthropy Initiative. Two years later, this report examines how the five programs selected for their outstanding work in K-12 education reform have reached more students and improved educational outcomes as a result of the more than $15 million contributed to the Initiative by Roundtable CEOs