Effectiveness of the ABCYa as Educational Technique to Improve

Student Achievement of Mathematics at Grade 4

Kamar Fayez Kamar

201870032

Thesis Proposal Dev. Seminar 1

CURR6401
Department of Curriculum and Instruction
United Arab Emirates University

Supervisor: Dr. Adeeb Jarrah

CHAPTER ONE

Introduction

In the words of Allenby and Sarewitz (2011): "technology is not just a matter of innovation;

it is also a matter of adoption by a critical mass of users, and it co-evolves with cultural,

economic, political and other domains, each of which continually affects, and is in turn

affected by the other. (p. 35)".

Nowadays people are affected by many factors around them and their lives are changing

every minute and even every second because of technology. The most unique effect occurred

on human beings is technology. As was mentioned by some authors that said the world today

as exiting in an information age and an era of network societies (Bann and Rowley 2008:

Castells 2004: Chen and Wellman 2004: Hite et al. 2010).

Today's world can be recognized as the cyber and computerized world that found with

information and network societies.

The continuing growth of technology around the world is considered to be one of the

strongest and powerful growth happing in the world in the forty years. Technology is an

education that has been rising rapidly over the last years.

Technology develops yearly, each year there is a new method and new information to be

learned. It is offering a strong way of connecting and communicating people with each other

all over the world. Every company and institute depending on technology and the cyber

world and most of those companies spend a huge amount of investments in the digital and

cyber information to be raised and developed and in addition enhancing technology is

happening on weekly basis.

The important progress of technology is deeply surrounded and part of other social

developments. Therefore, the relationship between technological and economic development

is worth taking note of.

Technology is not only a tool that can go by itself, but it also needs moral vision and

commitment to the whole world and society and to place what is important and valuable.

Moreover, technology is a wanted way of communication.

Technology has transformed many sectors around the world and one of the most important

sectors in the education field. It has a huge effect on education, and it was remarkable the

change that occurred on education when technology was used and how it is improving the

methods and the levels of learning.

Modern technology provides an opportunity for change towards schools, educators, and even

more on subjects. It has a great effect on teaching and learning. Implementing technology on

education raise the need to study and learn more.

There is a remarkable outburst in schools around the world in the use of technology with all

levels of students. Technology is increasingly growing as applications, programs, and online

learning has been developed more and more throughout years to enhance teaching and

learning abilities.

Teachers and educators are using information technology as a source and a tool to integrate

their work and to improve class management, curriculum enhancements, lesson planning and

learnings methods. Moreover, technology has developed learning levels by using it with other

subjects to support the teaching activities, student’s experience of learning and to improve

student’s outcomes towards the subject.

The main idea of including technology into the education sector is to modernize the school

and improve skills and performances of students, and these days learning has been known as

cooperative and hands-on activities; it evolves using a lot of methods to be able to send the

required skills to students. Playing while learning has been known to be on the most effective

ways to teach especially early students, it means learning, communication with them. A

school is a place of learning and education and modern schools are evolving and developing
with their methods of teaching and here the technology comes to support teaching and

students to make them able to understand in an easier and more encouraging way. The new

generation is developing and by that methods needs to be developed in a way to

accommodate learners and educators, and here when schools put into practice the teaching

process by using the computerized world.

Technology has been a major aspect in developing and teaching many areas especially

Mathematics around schools and more specifically among the primary cycle. Many

applications have been used to support and enhance the teaching methods of Mathematics

among students. Moreover, using educational online games has been known to be a major

and significant method to improve learning understanding of many topics in Mathematics.

Therefore, the aim of this research is to examine the effects of the use of web-based games on

student’s level of learning towards mathematical skills of fourth graders.

Statement of the Problem

Education sector is facing a huge increase usage of the information technology, multimedia,

videos, and educational web-based games (E-WBG). E-WBG offers a very interesting chance

for improvements of learning levels by giving students ready websites that allows them to

learn through educational games.

Currently, schools have seen that technology can change the learning levels and

performances especially in the way teachers teach and students learn, but it still lacks

evidence that will support this theory as was mentioned by Surry and Land, 2000: “teachers’

utilization of innovative technologies has remained low”.

This study aims to achieve one major purpose, to look into the impact of using educational

web-based games (E-WBG) in Al Ain Primary Schools.

Research Objective:

1. Identifying methods to enhance learning levels using E-WBG.

2. Identifying the effect of E-WBG on student’s achievements and learning levels.

Purpose of The Study

The specific purpose of this study is to determine the impacts of the educational web-based

games (E-WBG) on teaching primary students especially grade four while learning

mathematics in a specific area that is numbers and operations.

The study is to obtain an insight into the current development of student's level of learning

towards mathematics by using abcya.com educational website.

Moreover, this study is about examining the effects of educational application and web-based

games instead of using the traditional paper worksheets on primary students in one content

area that is numbers and operations. Stating if the educational applications and web-based

games enhance learning towards primary students will provide a shred of significant evidence

in this study.

For the above-mentioned purpose, this research will take a huge opportunity to declare and

state if technology can be valuable and enhance teaching.

Research Questions

The goal of the study to examine effects of technology on students and the main aim is to use

modern technologies such as an education website "abcya.com" in order to develop and

engage students more into the learning process. The researcher observes that primary students

are motivated by using educational applications and web-based games.

The main questions of the study are to:

1. What is the impact of E-WBG on primary school students in Al Ain?

2. What is the difference between paper-pencil learning and Educational web-based

Games (E-WBG)?

3. How does the use of educational applications “E-WBG” for teaching numbers and

operations for primary students enhance learning abilities and levels?

The Significance of The Study

The findings of this study will benefit the educational system and as well as the curriculum

planners to tackle the problems of teaching Mathematics for younger age students in Al Ain

Primary Schools. This will enable them to plan the best methods of teaching Mathematics

skills for students.

The result will assist educators, schools and others in making decision on how to ensure a

hitch-free planning for better education.

Finally. The findings will provide the basic for further investigation into the effect of E-WBG

in primary schools of Al Ain.

Understanding educational applications is a way of helping and developing a student's level

of learning that can be used and applied in the classrooms of any school sector. As such,

understanding the implications of educational applications and web-based games in

improving student's learning at numbers and operations can help schools and educators

develop and create a better way of teaching and a better curriculum to adopt for primary

students.
Limitations and Assumptions

Many limitations to the study are observed from the researcher's analysis, a very large

number of populations included, due to that only specific classrooms will be tested to the

case study and results can't be generalized to all schools in Al Ain schools.

In addition, teachers may not be well trained on how to use educational web-based games to

assist students with technical difficulties.

At this research there are many assumptions to point out as the technology is used in most of

the classrooms nowadays, student's mathematics background and knowledge are high at the

primary levels. Moreover, E-WBG is available in most areas and used in the primary grades.

Definitions of Terms

Educational Web-based games (E-WBG): it's an online game that is played via tablets, iPad

or a computer using a web browser over the internet. It is written in web browser languages

like HTML or PHP. These games have educational purposes to help students engage more in

learning and studying.

References:
Newby, L. S., Hite, J. M., Hite, S. J., & Mugimu, C. B. (2013). Technology and education:
ICT in Ugandan secondary schools. Education and Information Technologies, 18(3), 515-
530. doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.uaeu.ac.ae/10.1007/s10639-011-9180-x

Smith, P. (2018, Oct 05). TECHNOLOGY. The Australian Financial Review Retrieved from
https://search-proquest-com.ezproxy.uaeu.ac.ae/docview/2116055913?accountid=62373

Cloete, A. L. (2017). Technology and education: Challenges and opportunities.Hervormde

Teologiese Studies, 73(3) doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.uaeu.ac.ae/10.4102/hts.v73i4.4589

Allenby, B. R. & Sarew, D., 2011, The techno-human condition, The MIT Press, Cambridge.

Sămărescu Nicoleta, 2011, ‘How Can Technology Improve Math Learning Process, doi:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2011.01.055

Tarantola, A. (2016). The aftermath: Technology to the rescue.