[Maths-Education] Re: ICT in mathematics

[Tandi Clausen-May]

Sarah Maugham asked for 'evidence about whether ICT has a positive impact on
attainment in mathematics'.  
Alexandre Borovik  wrote 'I would suggest to define "success" first, and
only then discuss how it could be measured'. 

This is a suggestion that everyone, from an Early Years/Foundation teacher
to (I assume) a university teacher, would support.  But that does not change
the sorry fact that the way in which attainment is usually measured in
schools is with a test - and written key stage test and GCSE questions are
not designed to assess what pupils learn using mathematics tool software.
If the assessment required pupils to use Geogebra or Autograph to do some
mathematics then they would probably be more successful if they had learnt
some mathematics using these tools, so ICT would have 'a positive impact on
attainment in mathematics'.  But the assessments do not require this, so the
evidence is hard to find.
Tandi

Tandi Clausen-May
Independent Consultant
Mathematics curriculum and assessment
Special education