Abstract not found

This study validates a pedagogical framework, which integrates a mainstream game to teach the technology supporting that game. Technologies in learning games can engage students and make the learning contents interesting to them. However, technologies themselves are seldom the subject of learning in the game they support. In addition, learning activities in a gaming context usually engage students temporarily in the subject. As soon as the game is over, students ’ desire for learning may cease. The framework tries to achieve the transition of students ’ interests from the initial interest motivated by the game to the later-developed cognitive and personal interests in the subject. Based on the framework, this study designs and experiments a practice to evaluate the proposed framework. Participants ’ subjective responses show their satisfaction about the practice of learning and developing interest of the subject matter. This study not only provides a dual aspect of game technology adoption for motivating students, but also proposes a pedagogical framework for students ’ lasting learning. It is expected to provide a new and valuable idea about the use of technologies and games in education.

This paper reports gender differences in the types of interests that middle school students have towards statistical literacy. These differences are detected from the responses of a sample of 366 middle school students to items in a statistical literacy interest inventory. In particular, dominance statistics are calculated in order to detect evidence for gender differences in student responses. Results indicated that girls were more interested in aspects of statistical literacy that related to surveys and boys were more interested in aspects relating to problem solving and also contexts that are associated with sports. The findings are interpreted using Dweck’s achievement goal theory as it pertains to gender, and classroom implications are reviewed. There is currently a shortage of mathematics and statistics graduates in Australia. In their review of mathematical sciences research, the Australian Academy of Science (2006) reported that in 2003 only 0.4 % of Australian graduates majored in either mathematics or statistics, which compared unfavourably with an OECD average of 1%. Further, the Australian Bureau of Statistics has reported difficulty in obtaining suitably qualified statistics graduates (Trewin, 2005). Such shortages have their origins in the secondary school context, where the number of students enrolled in higher level mathematics courses

This paper reviews factors that contribute to the development of middle school students ’ interest in statistical literacy and its motivational influence on learning. To date very little research has specifically examined the influence of positive affect such as interest on learning in the middle-school statistics context. Two bodies of associated research are available: interest research in a mathematics education context and attitudinal research in a tertiary statistics context. A content analysis of this literature suggests that interest development in middle school statistics will be the result of a complex interplay of classroom influences and individual factors such as: students ’ knowledge of statistics, their enjoyment of statistics and their perceptions of competency in relation to the learning of statistics.

America’s youth perceive Computer Science to be difficult, tedious, boring, irrelevant and asocial. Unfortunately, many traditional introductory Computer Science classes and textbooks do little to improve that image. In contrast, contextualized approaches to teaching introductory Computer Science are very attractive. Instead of writing a leap year program, students can learn about conditional statements by programming a robot to follow a light, or by creating an animation to tell a story, or even by modifying a picture of the college president so that she is wearing a neon orange jacket instead of a navy blue one. The arguments in favor of contextualized approaches to attract non-Computer-Science-majors to our classes are very persuasive. But what about students who then choose to major or minor in Computer Science? Of course we want to offer them interesting and engaging first courses in Computer Science, and indeed this may help with our efforts to attract more students to our programs. But what happens in subsequent semesters? The purpose of this paper is to initiate a general discussion on the use of any sort of “cool ” new approach into both undergraduate and K-12 Computer Science education. These approaches successfully attract students to study subjects that we ourselves are deeply engaged in. But we need to discuss as a community what happens to students who do choose to major or minor in Computer Science when our individual classes conclude and the rest of their studies commence.