IJIET
Vol. 2, No. 1, January 2018
51
difference in the student’s performance in posttest scores in addition between the
control group and the experimental group after the abacus training. From this
result, we concluded that there is no effect in student’s performance in terms of
accuracy for addition after the abacus training. One factor that might explain this
performance for both groups is that the pupils are already in Grade Three, which
means that they have acquired the necessary foundational skills related to addition
in Grades One and Two. In turn, increasing the digit span should not have posed a
significant difficulty
in obtaining the sum, regardless of method or device used.
Moreover, a research by Wu, et al (2009, p.440)
showed that there is no
significant difference between abacus and non-abacus users when it came to
simple addition questions, and that both groups showed high levels of accuracy.
This is parallel to the results obtained for the addition posttest.
For
experimental group, even if they know the rules of abacus, they still
need more time to practice in addition that involved a longer digit span. Regarding
the
practice of abacus, Stigler’s research in Taiwan (1986) found that “Mental
abacus skill was found to develop primarily as a result of practice rather than of
selection factors such as socioeconomic status, ability and previous mathematical
knowledge” (p. 447). During the trainning, the researchers did not focus much in
doing addittion that involved two to three digit numbers, but instead devoted more
time in doing addition through
asas
(i.e. repeated addition) since some students in
the experimental group had not yet mastered mental abacus for the multiplication
of 2-digit by 1-digit numbers, which is a requirement to do abacus quickly for
multi-digit multiplication.
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