|Published online: August 15, 2014||$US5.00|
The teaching and learning of mathematics in secondary schools is often characterized by a set of steps for performing a calculation. As a result, many students find mathematics uninteresting and difficult. With that environment in mind, this study investigates the relative effectiveness of calculator use on students’ academic achievement in secondary school mathematics in Ogun State, Nigeria. The sample for the study consisted of 230 boys and 215 girls at fifteen public secondary schools in Ogun State. The authors selected the schools because they staffed qualified and experienced teachers and offered functional classrooms. The study used a stratified, random sampling technique to include rural and urban, old- and new-generation, and single-sex and co-educational schools. The researchers administered to the students two parallel mathematics tests to measure cognitive achievement and used T-test statistics to answer two research hypotheses. The results suggest that there is a significant difference between the performance of students who use calculators and those who do not. The authors therefore recommend that examining bodies and school authorities should allow the use of calculators to supplement the teaching and learning of mathematics in secondary schools.
|Keywords:||Electronic Calculator, Mathematics, Achievement, Curriculum|
The International Journal of Technologies in Learning, Volume 21, Issue 1, December 2014, pp.1-7. Article: Print (Spiral Bound). Published online: August 15, 2014 (Article: Electronic (PDF File; 570.672KB)).
Lecturer, Department of Educational Foundations and Instructional Technology, College of Applied Education and Vocational Technology, Tai Solarin University of Education, Ijagun, Ogun, Nigeria
Lecturer, Department of Educational Foundations and Instructional Technology, College of Applied Educational and Vocational Technology, Tai Solarin University of Education, Ijagun, Ogun, Nigeria