| The purpose of this exploratory study was to examine instructor and student attitudes towards the use of the graphing calculator in the developmental mathematics classroom. A focus of the study was to see if instructors or students believed there were changes in the conceptual understanding of mathematics as a result of graphing calculator implementation. Twenty-two students and eleven instructors participated in this study via an online, author-generated survey consisting of Likert-type questions and open-response questions. All data were analyzed by descriptive statistics and scrutinized for modal, noteworthy responses.;Results of this study yielded two subcategories of individuals each within the sample of instructors and students: those who did use the graphing calculator in the classroom and those who did not. Overall, instructors and students believed that the best use of the graphing calculator in the developmental mathematics classroom was to simplify complex computations and formulas. Among both groups, it was uncertain if any change in conceptual understanding would occur because of graphing calculator use. Although this tool was likely to be used within a classroom setting, both instructors and students believed more than likely that students would not use this tool to apply to contexts outside of the classroom setting. |
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