A New Approach in Teaching of Mathematics in Primary School: Lego MoretoMath

Yıl 2016, Cilt: 5 Sayı: 2, 59 - 71, 29.07.2016

Habibe Kazez , Zülfü Genç

Öz

The course of mathematics is a discipline which is frequently used in daily life and which underlies in numerous developments particularly the technological innovations in our era. This field which is commonly used similarly both in many periods of history and today is in the basis of numerous methods and techniques used in development of civilizations, advancements in science and arts, wars between countries, and land share in past. As today's needs are different compared to the past, it is required to train individuals, who are more productive, interrogator, can criticize and have a good knowledge of various information areas and disciplines, needed in information and technology era rather than activities based on muscle and body strength. The fact that the mathematics playing a major role in development of these skills is considered by students as a difficult course and that it is a frightening course makes mathematics the greatest problem to prevent us the contrary to what it should be in scientific and technological developments to be realized. Therefore, the process of development and testing of different approaches in teaching of mathematics has rapidly increased in recent years. The common point of these approaches is to visualize mathematics, to concretize the abstract concepts and to prepare
environments which enable students to reach whatever they have learnt to higher level than the information and comprehension level and to integrate mathematics to their daily life by supporting the objectives and gains specified in each age group via materials. Lego, which is one of these approaches and entered as toys in our life in previous years, has been started to be used, in recent years, as robotic systems especially in courses of science and technology due to the development of computer technologies. Furthermore, the curriculums intended to the
development of students in basic engineering knowledge and courses of mathematics have begun to develop physical and technological materials. MoretoMath as the first set developed toward mathematics is an activity set consisting of basically three main components intended to the grade 1 and 2 students of primary school, which was released in 2015 and which has not Turkish language support yet. The first component is the curriculum consisting of teacher’s guideline intended to teachers and working sheets depending on activities intended to students. The second component is the computer software prepared for curriculum activities and finally the third component is Lego bricks parts which are used physically in all activities and which are required for formation of model by students in questions. The purpose of this study was to understand the opinions of classroom teacher on software, curriculum, material, and application size of the set throughout the application for 10 weeks in activities based on development of reasoning and problem solving skills in the lesson of mathematics in second grades of primary school which is one of the target groups of the Lego MoretoMath set. An observation form and semistructured open-ended interview questions were used as data collection instruments in the study designed as qualitative case study. It was observed as a result of the study that the classroom teacher considered some of the questions in the activity as difficult with respect to the student level and that he thought that questions could be different from curriculum of the Ministry of National Education in some subjects. It was observed that he thought that the software was very important in concretization of abstract concepts and he stated an opinion that its usage was easy and the Lego parts used as building bricks or as simple instruments made a major contribution to psychomotor development of the student and acquisition of basic mathematical competencies by adding another dimension to the subject. It is considered that the opinions of the teacher are important in the sense that they will be guiding for the individuals who will apply the set in the future as they are intended to ease the use of MoretoMath in classroom environment and to develop the application.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Lego, MoretoMath, mathematics, case study, technological innovation, bricks

İlkokul Matematik Öğretiminde Yeni Bir Yaklaşım: Lego MoretoMath

Öz

Matematik dersi günlük hayatta sıklıkla kullanılan ve çağımızdaki pek çok gelişmenin özellikle de teknolojik yeniliklerin temelinde yer alan bir bilim dalıdır. Matematik öğretiminde kullanılan MoretoMath ise, ilkokul 1 ve 2. sınıf öğrencilerine yönelik hazırlanan bir aktivite setidir. Bu araştırmada Lego MoretoMath setinin hedef kitlesinden biri olan ilkokul 2. Sınıflarda matematik dersinde akıl yürütme ve problem çözme becerilerini geliştirmeye dayalı etkinliklerde 10 hafta süreyle uygulanması sırasında sınıf öğretmeninin sete dair yazılım, eğitim programı, materyal ve uygulama boyutu hakkındaki görüşlerinin anlaşılması amaçlanmıştır. Nitel bir durum çalışması olarak dizayn edilen araştırmada veri toplama aracı olarak gözlem formu ve yarı yapılandırılmış açık uçlu mülakat soruları kullanılmıştır. Araştırmanın sonucunda sınıf öğretmeninin aktivite içindeki soruların bazılarını öğrenci seviyesine göre zor bulduğu, soruların bazı konularda Milli Eğitim programına göre farklılıklar gösterebildiğini düşündüğü görülmüştür. Yazılımın soyut kavramları somutlaştırmada büyük önem taşıdığını düşündüğünü, kullanımının kolay olduğunu ve yapı oyuncakları veya basit araç gereç olarak kullanılan Lego parçalarının ise olaya başka bir boyut katarak öğrencinin psiko-motor gelişimine yönelik ve temel matematik yeterliklerinin kazanımına yönelik büyük bir katkısı olduğu şeklinde fikir belirttiği görülmüştür. Öğretmenin görüşlerinin ise MoretoMath’ in sınıf ortamında kullanımını kolaylaştırmaya ve uygulamayı geliştirmeye yönelik olmasından dolayı gelecekte seti kullanacak bireylere yol gösterici olması açısından önemli olduğu düşünülmektedir. 

Anahtar Kelimeler

Lego, MoretoMath, matematik, durum çalışması, teknolojik yenilik, yapı oyuncağı, eğitim programı