WHY I HATE COMPUTERS: PRESERVICE TEACHER ATTITUDES TOWARDS TECHNOLOGY IN MATHEMATICS CLASSROOM

Paul Yu

Illinois State University

pwyu@ilstu.edu

I have observed that many pre-service education majors enter college lacking the ability to appropriately use technology in the mathematics classroom. The purpose of this case study was to investigate present attitudes towards technology of pre-service teachers through the thoughts and feelings of a one elementary education major that is intimated by technology in a mathematics classroom. The participant in this study was taken from an elementary education mathematics content course at Illinois State University. The data sources for this pilot study consisted of a survey, pre-interview, classroom observation and post interview, all conducted on separate days. The subject describes herself as one who is "frustrated" by technology. However, while she feels some frustration towards technology, she experiences conflict in that at the same time sees the benefits of technology. This conflict is as a result of a dualistic view towards technology. On one hand, technology is equated with mathematics, a subject she dislikes. On the other hand, she has experienced many educational benefits of technology; for example, the benefit of using a word processor verses using a typewriter, and research on the Internet verses driving to the library. In these cases her attitude towards technology is favorable since the benefits of technology outweigh the frustration of trying to learn how to use the technology. However, in her mathematics experience, the benefit of technology in the classroom as a learning tool did not seem evident to her. Since such conflict exists, it is important that teacher-training experiences bring students through this conflict by creating academically rich and positive experiences with technology in the mathematics classroom.