DescriptionEducational policymakers have been working to strengthen mathematics education by adopting rigorous mathematics standards that promote a conceptual understanding of math. Though this shift is nationwide, Black and Hispanic students in urban schools tend to be exposed to math instruction that emphasizes rote memorization and procedural knowledge of math. One reason attributed to the poor performance of students in math in urban schools is the lack of high quality instruction.
The purpose of this dissertation was to test the impact of an intelligent tutoring system, MathConceptz, that aims to improve student performance in Algebra. Using pre- and post-test results, this study sought to demonstrate whether MathConceptz builds students’ conceptual understanding of Algebra topics, as well as provides a possible solution to the issue of poor teacher quality in urbans schools. The research questions that guided this study were: How do pre- and post-test results compare from the face-to-face instruction group and the blended learning (face-to-face and existing ITS) group? How do pre- and post-test results compare between the face-to-face instruction group and the MathConceptz group? How do pre- and post-test results compare between the blended learning (face-to-face and MathConceptz) group and the MathConceptz group?
An experimental research design was employed to test the impact of MathConceptz on student pre- and post-test results. A sample of 79, 8th and 9th grade students were administered a pre-test and received face-to-face instruction, MathConceptz instruction, or a combination of both, followed by a post-test. An ANOVA was conducted on the data collected to show the impact of MathConceptz measured against several variables including teacher quality and student demographics.
Findings from this study showed a significant difference in test scores between the face-to-face instruction group and the blended instruction group. These findings suggest that using intelligent tutoring systems, such as MathConceptz, to supplement instruction may be a viable solution to the issue of instructional quality in urban areas, while also building students’ conceptual understanding of math.