Effects Of Web-Based Games On Mathematics Achievment Of

Grade Four
A Quantitative Study of abcya.com educational website

Effectiveness of the ABCYa as Educational Technique to Improve

Student Achievement of Mathematics at Grade 4

STUDENT NAME: KAMAR FAYEZ KAMAR

STUDENT NUMBER: 201870032
COURSE NAME: THESIS PROPOSAL DEV. SEMINAR 1
DEPARTMENT: DEPARTMENT OF CURRICULUM AND INSTRUCTION
COURSE CODE: CURR6401

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 we-based games (WBG). 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 problem of this study is to determine if there is a relationship between using technology

and teaching mathematics using abcya.com educational website.

The topic was selected to research about implications of educational applications and web-

based games to examine the effects on the student's level of learning and the academic

achievements on studying math areas as numbers and operations using abcya.com. The study

emphasizes the uses of applications and web-based games for primary students in Al Ain

schools.

Research Objective:

1. Identifying methods to enhance learning levels using WBG.

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

Purpose of The Study

The purpose of this research from the author's point of view is to examine the effects of web-

based games (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 influence of the use of WBG on schools' students?

2. What are the effects of educational applications on student's learning levels?

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

operations for primary students enhance learning abilities and levels?

The Significance of The Study

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.

In addition, the findings of the study could be generalized to be applied to a wider population,

but if the findings were questionable, then the researcher will propose future study areas for

more testing.
Definitions of Terms

Educational applications (E-app): they are educational software or computer applications that

are created to serve and assist educators and students in improving learning levels.

Web-based games (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.

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 applications and 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, the E-app and WBG are available in most areas and used in the

primary grades.
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