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Game-Based Training to Promote Arithmetic Fluency

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journal contribution
posted on 2020-09-25, 11:05 authored by Timothy Jay, Jake Habgood, Martyn Mees, Paul Howard-Jones
The research team designed and evaluated a mobile game to promote rapid retrieval of arithmetic facts among a group of children aged 7–8 years (n = 97). The design of the game was based on principles drawn from research literature in mathematical cognition, game-based learning, and game design. The game trains basic number knowledge within a motivating context. It tested an implication of theory of automatization of arithmetic facts that training of recognition of multiples of single-digit numbers should lead to greater fluency in solving multiplication and division problems. A quasi-experimental design was employed to test whether the game improves retrieval of arithmetic facts. Children played the game in their classrooms for 20 min a day for 2 weeks. Comparisons between pre- and post-tests showed that the game playing group outperformed controls with a medium to large effect size (>0.6). These results suggest an improvement in arithmetic fluency equivalent to around 7 months' progress and provide rare empirical evidence supporting transfer of game-based training to a pencil-and-paper test. The findings are consistent with a connectionist theory of arithmetic skill, by showing that improved recognition of multiples contributes to multiplication and division skill. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

Funding

Research Project Grant from the Leverhulme Trust

History

School

  • Science

Department

  • Mathematics Education Centre

Published in

Frontiers in Education

Volume

4

Pages

118

Publisher

Frontiers Media

Version

  • VoR (Version of Record)

Rights holder

© The Authors

Publisher statement

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

Acceptance date

2019-10-04

Publication date

2019-10-22

Copyright date

2019

eISSN

2504-284X

Language

  • en

Depositor

Prof Tim Jay. Deposit date: 10 February 2020

Article number

118

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