Date

2003

Author

Üstün, Işıl

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The main purpose of the study was to investigate the effects of a dynamic instructional environment (based on use of Geometer's Sketchpad) on 7th grade students' understandings of lines, angles, and polygons and their retention. Besides that, the students' attitudes towards computer instruction and its relation with students' performance on geometry and retention were investigated. The study was carried out with 63 7th grade students from two classes taught by the same teacher in a state elementary school in Karabük. One class was assigned as the experimental group (EG), the other as the control group (CG). Students in CG received the instruction on lines, angles, and polygons by the regular traditional method used at the school. In the EG, students worked on the computer activities named as "Sketchsheets", prepared by the researcher, with computers provided at the computer-lab. The usage of GSP with Sketchsheets enabled students to create the shapes first and after they explored and discovered the properties of shapes and make generalisations for the development of conjectures. Geometry Performance Test (GPT) and Computer Attitude Scale (CAS) were used in this study. The GPT was administered to both groups of students as a pre-test, post-test, and a delayed post-test. CAS was administered only to the EG students as a post-test. Furthermore, interviews were carried out with three students from EG in order to get their feelings about the dynamic instructional environment. Besides that, both of these classroom and computer sessions were observed and recorded with camera. The results of t-test suggest that GPT mean scores in EG and CG did not significantly differ in pre-test, but EG achieved significantly better than the CG in post and delay-post tests. CAS mean scores and interviews showed that students had positive feelings and decisions towards computer instruction and they preferred computer instruction to traditional instruction. Furthermore, Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient was performed in order to investigate the relationship between GPT scores and CAS scores. From this analysis, a significant correlation was observed between the GPT scores and CAS scores. This means that the students who had positive attitudes towards computer instruction, achieved significantly better at GPT. The results of this study revealed that Geometer's Sketchpad for learning and teaching geometry in elementary school level is an effective tool.

Subject Keywords

Geometry, Computer-assisted instruction, Learning, Educational technology, Computer-based learning, Dynamic instructional environment, Geometry performance, Attitude towards computer

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/13733

Collections

Graduate School of Natural and Applied Sciences, Thesis