INTEGRATE SELECTED WEB
2.0 TOOLS (SKYPE) INTO COLLEGE MATHEMATICS CURRICULUM TO ENHANCE STUDENT’S
LEARNING / PERFORMANCE IN MATHEMATICS.
CHAPTER ONE
Background of the study
Information and communication
technologies (ICT) have grown increasingly universal, powerful, and adaptable.
These had change the world we live in and how we learn to live. Since the
introduction of ICT in education, schools now face new social, cultural and
pedagogical phenomena. Teachers are now faced with challenges in term of their
technical abilities, knowledge and experience. ICT creates new possibilities,
dilemmas, and directions and encourages teachers to harness the new
opportunities that ICT offers to make teaching and learning more meaningful and
rewarding. The ability to utilize ICT has become the literacy for the 21st
century. ICT can change teaching and learning by being a source of knowledge, a
medium for transmitting content, and an interactive resource furthering
dialogue and creative exploration. (Cuban, 2001), ICT is thus considered to be
both the cause of change and a major means of achieving it.
National Centre for Education and
Statistics (NCES) 2005, further highlight that despite considerable investment,
ICT implementation advances at a slower rate than expected in the educational
systems of many countries.
Furthermore, despite the growing body
of evidence supporting the influence of ICT on learning processes, its impact
on the teacher and students, tapping this tremendous resource largely depends
on how the teacher use ICT(mills et al, 2003).
Current discussions among technology
advocates suggest that web 2.0 application have tremendous potential to
transform student’s learning. (NCES, 2010) recent survey show that web 2.0
tools such as Facebook, MySpace, Wikis and Blogs are part of nearly every
student’s home life. (Consortium for School Networking 2009).
IESD 2009, gave high expectation but
little use, expert are renewing calls to do qualitative and situated research
on web 2.0 in the classroom to understand better how this new network
technologies and social media might play out and be harnessed for students
learning (Greenhow et al, 2009).
This study explores teachers view on
factors affecting their use of information and communication technology (ICT)
in the classroom and how these views reflect changes in the teacher’s education
beliefs and actual classroom.
Therefore, the study focus on this in
the context of a classroom which integrates technology based information rich
tasks with the school curriculum.
Web 2.0 tools is creating a new kind
of participatory medium that is ideal for supporting multiple modes of learning
(Brown et al, 2008) tools such as Wikis, Blogs, Skype, Podcast, Slide wares
etc., enables students to create, apply, share their knowledge in an authentic
fashion and contributing to global community of internet user.
Bush et al (2011), highlight that web
2.0 tools are not specifically developed for mathematics education but can be
adopted for the purpose.
Web 2.0 tools which are social
networking or media is promoted by several prominent organizations. In its
principle and standard for school mathematics, the national council of teachers
of mathematics (NCTM), 2000 promotes the technology principle that states
“technology is essential in teaching and learning mathematics”. It influences
the mathematics that is taught and enhances student learning. As internet
services grow and develop, web 2.0 tools are also able to influence the
curriculum enhance learning.
NCTM warns that “Technology is not a
panacea”. It can be used well or poorly like an other teaching tools. It is
most important that teacher develop their web 2.0 tools skill on their own or
through formal professional development in order to effectively use these new
tools.
Today
the ubiquitous technology is a collection of new generation web-based tools and
businesses that form a participatory web. Many of
these tools are free; many are social in nature and promote self-expression.
Many allow multiple users to
participate by editing, commenting and polishing a document collaborative
rather than working alone.
Another perspective that justifies
the use of web 2.0 tools in mathematics education is Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy
(Krathwohl, 2002).
The highest level is “creating” which
involves “putting elements together to form a novel coherent whole or make an
original product. Page 215 of the above text also states that it encourage
students to create mathematical products with web 2.0 tools and sharing them
with the world is a modern and authentic way to incorporate the highest level
of Bloom’s Taxonomy.
Web 2.0 is a collaborative web
development platform that fosters the development of participatory web
application. This application allows the
user to add, control and share information, interactively, simultaneously and
interoperable through a browser from anywhere with an internet connection.
The advantage of web 2.0 technologies
and their accessibility using computers and handheld cellular devices has held
to a radical change in the life style of the young students in Nigeria and
worldwide. Young spent more time using computer, internet and mobile devices
than any other age group. Web 2.0 tools and its application has become an
integral part of student’s life.
When student arrives in high school,
colleges and the university having multitasking operation skills in blogging,
broadcasting, tweeting and other web 2.0 applications due to their inclination
to the web 2.0 technologies mathematics instruction in the traditional
statistics mode might be sufficient to meet their needs.
In an online classroom, collaborative
learning can take the form of discussion among the whole class or within
smaller groups. This constructivism offers promising new approach to teaching,
since constructivism and socio – culturalism are the element of the two most
dominant cognition theories that have been applied to mathematics teaching
online learning. One method of motivation is to use technology to engage
students inside and outside the classroom. Web 2.0 based collaborative
environment student and teachers become self – motivated to engage themselves
inside and outside the classroom.
Interactive features of web 2.0 tools
motivate participants to spend more time and share their creativity to a
broader audience that might be possible in a regular classroom.
Types of web 2.0 tools
There are lots of tools under web
2.0, to mention few:
1.
Blogs
2.
Podcast
3.
Wikis
4.
Slide
ware
5.
Skype
6.
Social
bookmarking
7.
Twitter
Blogs:
This website is usually maintained by
an individual with regular entries of commentary, description of event or other
materials such as graphics or video.
Podcast:
This is a series of digital media
files which are distributed over the internet using syndication feeds for
playback on potable media players and computer; it enables students and
teachers to share information with anyone at anytime. An absent student can
download the recorded podcast.
Wikis:
It is a collection of web pages
designed to enable anyone to contribute or modify content such as the well
known Wikipedia.
Slideware:
This is software that exists only on
slide colourful, fancy PowerPoint driven presentation. It can be through
projector or via sharing online.
Skype:
This is a software program that
allows users to make video conference calls or discussion over the internet.
Social bookmarking:
This is a website with the primary
use of storing bookmarks online which allows access to the same researching and
working on a dissertation. This site is used to keep track of all the online
source material and commentaries.
Twitter:
It is a free social networking and
micro blogging service that allows to send “updates” or “tweets” (text – based
posts), to the website (twitter) via short message service on a cell phone
allowing instant messaging on facebook.
History of web 2.0
Web 2.0 is a term that describes the
changing trends in the use of worldwide web technology and web design that aim
to enhance creativity, secure information, sharing increased collaboration and
improve the functionality of the web as we know it (web 1.0). These have led to
the development and evolution of web – based communities and hosted services
such as social networking sites (Facebook, MySpace), Video-sharing sites
(Youtube), Wikis, and Blogs.
The term “web 2.0” was first in
January 1999 by Darcy DiNucci, a consultant on electronic information design
(information architecture). In article “fragment”, the web known now which loads
into a browser window in essentially static, screenful is only an embryo of the
web to come.
When Palm increase was introducing
its first web – capable personal digital assistant superting web access with
WAP, DiNucci saw the web “fragmenting” into a future that extended far beyond
the browser / PC combination. It was identified with her mission of the web
future focused on how the basic information structure and hyper linking
mechanism introduced by HTTP would be used by a variety of devices and platforms.
As such, her use of “2.0” designation refers to a next version of the web that
does not directly related to the terms currently used. Web 2.0 did not surface
until 2002. John Robb wrote “what is web 2.0?” it is a system that breaks the
old model of centralized websites and moves the power of the web / internet to
the desktop. Web 2.0 began its popularity in 2004, when O’Reilly media and
Media live hosted the first world conference.
Web 2.0 was initially championed by
bloggers and technology journalists culminating in the 2006 Time Magazine
person of the year. Time settled the masses of users who were participating in
content creation on social networks, blogs, Wikis and media sharing sites.
One of the most significant
differences between web 2.0 and the traditional World Wide Web (www.retroactively referred to as web 1.0) is greater collaboration among internet users,
social nature of the web 2.0 is another major difference.
From the history, web 2.0 is about revolutionary
new ways of creating, collaborating, editing and sharing user generated content
online. It’s also about ease of use. There is no need to download a program
since the application is web – based. These tools are wonderful for teachers to
increase their productivity.
Web 2.0 tools can be categorized into
four types of tools namely:
a)
Presentation
b)
Video
tools
c)
Mobile
tools
d)
Collaboration
/ Community tools
Web 2.0 tools website typically
include some of the following features:
1)
SEARCH:
Ease of finding information through
keyword searching.
2)
LINKS:
Guides to important pieces of
information. The best pages are most frequently link to.
3)
AUTHORING:
The ability to create constantly
updating content that is co – created by users.
4)
TAGS:
Categorization of content by creating
tags that are simply one word descriptions to facilitate searching and avoid
having to fit into rigid, pre – made categories.
5)
EXTENTIONS:
Automation of pattern matching for
customization by using algorithms (i.e. Amazon.com recommendation).
6)
SIGNALS:
The use of RSS (real simple
syndication) technology to create a subscription model which notifies users of
any content changes.
Statement of the problem
Many attempts have been to improve
learning of mathematics in Nigeria. Prominent among these is effort of the
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM). University, College of
Education, Federal and State government have not only develop innovative
mathematics curricula but have also organize conference, workshop and seminars
aimed at facilitating the teaching and learning of mathematics with advancement
in technology e.g. online teaching method in Mathematics.
In as much as mathematics is a
compulsory subject in secondary education curriculum, the main concern of this
study is to try to test the conventional method of teaching which the normal
classroom method is and that of a technological tools e.g. Web 2.0 tools technology and analyze the
performance of the two variables stated above.
Purpose of study
The purpose of this study is to integrate
educational technology application e.g. Web 2.0 technology tools into the
teaching of mathematic curriculum and to map out the effectiveness of selected
web 2.0 technology tools over the normal conventional classroom method of
teaching and learning process.
Research Questions
The following research questions were
raised to guide the study.
1)
Is there any significant difference in the performance of student taught
using conventional method and selected web 2.0 tools before the treatment?
2)
Is there any significant difference in the performance of students taught
using selected web 2.0 tools and those taught using conventional method after
the treatment?
3)
Is there any significant difference in the performance of male and female
students exposed to selected web 2.0 tools method of teaching?
Research Hypotheses
Based
on the research questions raised for this study, the following hypotheses were
formulated;
1.
There is no significant difference in the performance of the students
taught using selected web 2.0 tools and students taught using the conventional
method before treatment.
2.
There is no significant difference between the students taught using
selected web 2.0 tools and students taught using conventional method after
treatment.
3.
There is no significant difference in the performing of male and female
students exposed to web 2.0 tools method of teaching.
Significant of study
This study serves to analyze the
integration of selected web 2.0 tools in the teaching and learning NCE
mathematics.
The result of this study will lead
future developer of the curriculum in making necessary amendment to mathematics
curriculum.
Delimitation
There are lots of technological –
based tools that can be use in the teaching method but this research is
focusing on selected web 2.0 tools being integrated into the teaching of NCE
mathematics (curriculum) to enhance student learning ability.
