Primary school mathematics during the COVID-19 pandemic: No evidence of learning gaps in adaptive practicing results

Abstract

Background The COVID-19 pandemic induced many governments to close schools for months. Evidence so far suggests that learning has suffered as a result. Here, it is investigated whether forms of computer-assisted learning mitigated the decrements in learning observed during the lockdown. Method Performance of 53,656 primary school students who used adaptive practicing software for mathematics was compared to performance of similar students in the preceding year. Results During the lockdown progress was faster than it had been the year before, contradicting results reported so far. These enhanced gains were correlated with increased use, and remained after the lockdown ended. This was the case for all grades but more so for lower grades and for weak students, but less so for students in schools with disadvantaged populations. Conclusions These results suggest that adaptive practicing software may mitigate, or even reverse, the negative effects of school closures on mathematics learning.

Evaluating students’ engagement with an online learning environment during and after COVID-19 related school closures: A survival analysis approach

“…For example, more than 67,000 students registered with the online learning environment Bettermarks in Germany during the first two weeks of the first school closure (i.e., between March 15 th and April 1 st , 2020). Similar increases in users due to COVID-19 related school closures were reported for other online learning environments in other countries (in terms of the numbers of users and computed problem sets, respectively [4] , [5] , [6] ).…”

“…The sudden school closures in March 2020 pushed many schools – teachers and their classes – to use such online learning environments [ 1 , 2 , [4] , [5] , [6] ]. For example, more than 67,000 students registered with the online learning environment Bettermarks in Germany during the first two weeks of the first school closure (i.e., between March 15 th and April 1 st , 2020).…”

School Performance among Children and Adolescents during COVID-19 Pandemic: A Systematic Review

“…The research in databases retrieved 23,039 publications, from which 3515 were duplicates. After screening a total of 19,524 records by title, abstract, and full text, 42 of them were finally considered eligible [ 7 , 8 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 ] (Prisma Flow Chart— Figure 1 ).…”

“…The demographic characteristics are summarized in Table 1 . The majority of the studies were conducted in Europe (n = 19 studies) [ 13 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 ], followed by Asia (n = 13 studies) [ 7 , 8 , 10 , 11 , 15 , 16 , 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 ] and America (n = 7 studies) [ 12 , 14 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 ], while two studies were conducted in Africa [ 48 , 49 ] and one in Oceania [ 50 ]. The performance of 15,385,942 students was assessed.…”

“…In some studies where the subjects’ age was defined, the age range of the students was between 8 and 22 years old. Concerning the study design, 17 of the studies were cross-sectional [ 7 , 8 , 12 , 14 , 15 , 17 , 18 , 25 , 26 , 28 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 36 , 40 , 41 ] and 13 were cohort studies [ 19 , 21 , 23 , 24 , 27 , 29 , 30 , 37 , 38 , 45 , 46 , 49 , 50 ], while the rest were case studies (n = 5) [ 10 , 13 , 16 , 42 , 48 ] or mixed design studies (n = 5) [ 11 , 22 , 35 , 44 , 47 ]. One study was a qualitative description study [ 39 ] and one was a qualitative projection study [ 43 ] ( Table S1 ).…”