When it comes to the use of mobile technology in the classroom, one of the major challenges for the teacher is finding suitable applications that appropriately match the topic of study. In most areas of education there are tools for evaluating teaching materials, but there are few tools for evaluating mobile technology in the classroom. The lack of evaluation methods means that for teachers, who are increasingly using tablets in the primary level classrooms, the results can be “hit or miss”. The aim of the study is to propose and describe a new framework that enables primary school teachers to evaluate tablet-based games effectively. The proposed framework is adapted from the four-dimensional framework (FDF). Thereby, supporting teachers in the choice of suitable tablet-based games to use in their classrooms that balance the essential aspects of student engagement (or playability) and learning achievement. A small case study is carried out based on the evaluation of 30 iPads STEM applications. The proposed framework can predict the initial pitfalls of technical and design issues in applications before class use. The successfully evaluated applications are used for the experiment at primary school in Thailand. The improvement of students’ learning skill, behavioral outcomes, and teachers’ perspectives are not considered in this study.

The use of mobile computational devices among school children is increasing in developing countries. In order to clarify the trends of consuming technological devices, a survey study was carried out with 4,231 students across from the lower northern part of Thailand at Science Fair in Naresuan University between 2014 and 2017. The key findings illustrate smartphone usage is dramatically increasing while PCs and tablets usage is not stable in each year. It is becoming an essential technological device to access for the various purposes in their daily activities. Nonetheless, PCs is still heavily using as teaching aid material at school even students are more likely to access the portable computational devices such as tablets and smartphones than PCs. The breakdown study presents male and female students love to play games on all kinds of mobile devices. The evidences demonstrate mobile consumption amongst Thai school children is shifting towards positive and negative sides. Therefore, the constructive manner of technology consumptions might be varied on some influence factors such as individual knowledge, educational policy, parental controls and teachers’ attitudes towards using mobile devices at class.

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