Week 7 Discussion

In Using Games to Break the Symbol Barrier, Keith Devlin provides Wuzzit as an example of an educational math game that uses a game’s visual affordances to convey math concepts without abstract math symbols in the way. I found Devlin’s concept of the “symbol barrier” to be accurate and compelling, and perhaps a leading cause for the math anxiety that Berkowitz et al describe. Moreover, I believe Wuzzit is an excellent example of educational technology that actually uses the affordances of technology to do away with a barrier in traditional math classrooms. This increases accessibility to people who are fully capable of mastering Everyday Math without having to master mathematical notation first.

Wuzzit provides a good contrast to coolmath-games.com, which I actually researched for my technology redesign project. A lot of the points made in Understanding the Relationships Between Interest In Online Math Games and Academic Performance by Berkowitz et al about the credibility of math content in CoolMath’s games came up in my analysis as well. The website has a few math related games, but a lot more games just geared towards entertainment that do not provide learners with the opportunity to “process mathematical content actively” (Zhang 255). Thus, I feel that the website does not capitalize on the affordances of technology to provide meaningful learning experiences for its users. From an equity standpoint, and especially because this website has a lot of traffic from minority/lower socioeconomic background students, should standards or regulations exist for products that claim to be educational?