A Chinese proverb suggests ‘Tell me and I’ll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I’ll understand.’ How to involve or engage today’s learner is at the forefront of much educational research and was the impetus for the study reported herein. This study explored the perceptions of Year 4/5 students from nine separate schools in Western Australia about the use of the Handheld Game Console (HGC) Nintendo DS to develop mental mathematics skills. It revealed that students perceived the use of the HGCs as both fun and engaging. Further, students identified that they were challenged, developed strategies for success and made independent choices during these classes. These discussions are presented as a framework of factors that impacted on the participating students’ self-improvement, self-determination and self-esteem

Games technology in the form of hand-held game consoles (HGCs) when focussed on specific academic skill development has the capacity to engage students in learning and in turn produce positive academic results. This current research explores teacher perceptions of the implementation of HGCs to enhance the development of mental maths skills (namely the recall of single digit addition, subtraction and multiplication sums) in nine Year 4 classrooms and, through a series of structured interviews and observations, categorises these educators in terms of their role in the classroom. It was hypothesised that the teaching style would impact on the student's motivation and engagement when using the HGCs, however, it became evident that by maintaining set classroom structures the HGCs appeared to have the capacity to engage and motivate students, regardless of the approach of the teacher.

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