Formative Evaluation of a Mathematics Game for Out-of-School Children in Sudan

Abstract

Education for children in the developing world is in crisis, and children growing up in war are already at the sharp end of global development challenges: of the 57 million primary-age children who are out of school, almost half live in conflict zones (http://www.unicef.org/media/media_75652.html). This research is grounded in the issues of educating children living in these zones, with a particular focus on innovative approaches to access via online and distance learning using ICT. Within this approach, a mathematics game was developed in close cooperation with the Ministry of Education in Sudan, the Ahfad University for Women in Khartoum and children from target communities. The intention was to develop a game that enables children from those communities to autonomously learn mathematics covering a curriculum of 3 years. The objective of this research is to describe the design of this game in relation to its requirements-educational, contextual, cultural, and from a game design perspective. An additional goal is to find out if children can play the game, want to play it, and will play it again. For pragmatic reasons this evaluation has been carried out in the Netherlands, with a total of 15 Arabic-speaking children. Their backgrounds were Egyptian, Moroccan, and Sudanese. The ages varied between 5 and 9, and the group was made up of seven girls and eight boys. The game was played on three consecutive Saturdays; most children (8) played the game three times, some children played the game once (2) or twice (5). Using observation forms, semi-structured interviews-with the children and with their parents-and questionnaires, data about motivation, enjoyment, perceived difficulty and cooperation between children were collected. The game met most of the requirements. Educationally, the game taught the mathematical concepts in a way that was understood by the children. This means it fits the context as well: children can learn autonomously. Culturally, we received anecdotal evidence that the Sudanese context was portrayed in a correct way. From a game design perspective, there should have been more learner control, though. The results of the evaluation show that average enjoyment increased slightly over the 3 weeks: from 3.5 on a 5-point Likert scale in week 1 to 3.9 in week 3. The average perceived difficulty was low: starting at 2.6 in week 1 and decreasing in week 2 and 3 to 1.7. Average motivation was high: 4.5 on a 5-point Likert scale, and stayed almost the same during the evaluation. Average cooperation was high: around 4.5 on a 5-point Likert scale. The setting of this evaluation did not completely reflect the situation in Sudan; the children lived in the Netherlands and knew their mathematics. Still, it has provided worthwhile feedback to improve the game further.