The Impact and effectiveness of technology enhanced mathematics learning
ENWhat happens inside the classroom is crucial for pupils’ learning. Mathematics is mostly hard work and only small portion is accounted by talent. However emotions and enjoyment can facilitate the hard work and make it easily done. We can use technology to help pupils to complete more exercise, make practicing more interesting and motivate pupils, which in turn will improve learning performance and learning results. A 15-week research study was conducted by research team of University of Turku, Finland and Vilnius University, Lithuania. Three schools were selected for this study. From each school we had two 3rd grade classes, one with control group and one treatment group. There was altogether 140 pupils (N=140) of which 69 (N=69) formed the treatment group and 71 (N=71) formed the control group. Figure 1 describes the research setup. The test started with a pre-test and was followed by 15 week research phase. The research was concluded with a post-test. During the research period, pupils from treatment group had one mathematics lesson per week transformed into technology enhanced mathematics lesson using a virtual learning platform called ViLLE. The control group followed typical teaching without any changes. Identical tests for pre-test and post-test were used in the study. The test consisted of two parts. The first part measured mathematics performance in topics taught in 3rd grade. The second part was an arithmetic fluency test that measures how fast pupils can solve basic arithmetic facts. The study clearly showed that the treatment group outperformed the control group pupils with statistical significant difference both in mathematics performance and in arithmetic fluency. When we combine these results with our previous findings there is solid evidence that the digital learning path in ViLLE makes a radical improvement to pupils’ math learning. What makes it more amazing that we only replaced one lesson in a week.
