By Educational Activities, Inc., Basic Math Competency Skill Building: Decimals is a tutorial-and-practice learning system to teach basic mathematical operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division) with decimals. $59.95 for single program, $369 for set of eight. Macintosh/DOS.
This program provides drill and practice in basic math operations with decimals. A separate program exists for each operation at either an "easy" or "hard" difficulty level. The tutorial is presented in the form of sample problems followed by at least five practice problems. A ten problem quiz with running scores concludes each segment.
Special features include a tutorial button with sound option (reads instructions aloud during the tutorial dialog) and a context-sensitive help button (the question mark). With the EA Manager, teachers can view and print reports and rosters and create, edit and manipulate individual student information. Lessons are randomly generated so they may be repeated as often as necessary.
Although by design and annotated in the documentation, no
variation was provided in the set-up of problems and rote
answering might become a solution strategy for some students who
would therefore bypass the concept being taught. For example,
most of the addition problems had a number with three decimal
places added to a number with two decimal places which always
produced an answer with five decimal places, rather than
providing some variety for learners to explore their
understanding of the concept. [Top of
Page]
User Interface
Ease of Use: The standard Macintosh interface capabilities (pull down menus, help) are present and moving in and out of the tutorial sessions is quite straightforward. Decimal placement using the mouse took a few practices, but generally worked well. The EA Manager System for teachers and administrators is also easy to use. The graphics were appropriate but not widely varied.
In using this program with 4th grade learners, questions did arise in moving from sample problems to actual practice problems. The answers required were in different formats in these two procedures and the students were confused. Sample problems asked for step by step entry of numbers and the practice problems expected the whole answer to be entered.
Feedback: A good deal of retyping entries to set-up problems was required and any "typos" caused quiz answers to "fall through" as wrong. A preview of entries before answering the problem could prevent this but was not provided. The sample problems (the tutorials) did give explanations when answers were wrong and a sound option (text is read aloud) can be selected. It is, however, necessary to choose the sound option after each frame of the tutorial which can be tiresome.
I would have preferred a more non-judgemental message when the quiz score fell below par (it read "that was not very good") and a typo in the interface text made me wonder about attention to overall detail. The feedback in dialog when students made an error was not specific in some cases, so although learners knew they had made an error, they did not know the type of error. [Top of Page]
I recommend this program only in remedial situations and only where there was personal (human) assistance available. There will most likely be questions about using the system ("What do they want here?") for the reasons noted above. Use of this program will be most successful if previewed for exact competency and level of difficulty being remediated before assigning tasks.
Recommended Audience: developmentally geared for grades 4-6 and correctively for grades 7-12. [Top of Page]
Installation was done on an LCII 8/80 with System 7 operating system. Installation was simply installing disk software onto the hard drive. Instructions provided were clear and installation time very brief at about 3-5 minutes.
System requirements:
Macintosh computer with hard drive. 2MB under System 6 (version
6.0.5 or later) with MultiFinder off; 4MB under System 7 (or
later) or while using MultiFinder under System 6. Color or
Monochrome Monitor.
Product Support: Documentation was good with
overview, prerequisites, learning objectives and concise program
description. Special features were clearly enumerated and
worksheets for supplementary work were included. The
Installation Guide was also very easy to follow.
Calls to the 1-800 number were answered cordially and promptly. [Top of Page]
Other Reviews:
Booklist. December,1994.