Enhancing Self-Motivation Through Design of an Accessible Math App for Children with Special Needs

摘要

The inclusion of learning activities using tablet devices in the classroom environment continues to grow. Unfortunately, this corresponding increase has not correlated with a growth in accessible content for children with special needs. In fact, most children with a reported disability take fewer science and math courses than mainstream students primarily due to the unavailability of information in accessible formats. In this paper, we discuss an educational App that makes math engaging to students while being accessible to children with special needs. We then present a pilot study to collect empirical evidence on how well the app self-motivates the user. Results from the study, which involved thirty-four participants, show significant measures of self-motivation when using the educational math app.