The effects of use of a dynamic geometry software geogebra in teaching the subject of transformation geometry in seventh grade math class in a primary school on students achievement and retention levels

The aim of this study is to find out the effects of a dynamic geometry software program GeoGebra in teaching the subject of ?Transformation Geometry?, which is a part of primary school seventh grade Math class, on students? achievement and retention levels. This is an experimental study in which pre-test, post-test and control group have been used. The experimental group and the control group have not been formed or chosen randomly, which may be considered a limitation of the study. The participants of the study are 37 seventh grade students divided into two classrooms in a state primary school in Ankara. The study was conducted in Spring Term of 2011-2012 academic year. To find out the effects of a dynamic geometry software program GeoGebra on students? achievement and retention levels, an experimental group consisting of 17 students and a control group consisting of 20 students have been assigned. The experimental group was offered a GeoGebra based course for two weeks in accordance with Ministry of National Education curriculum. During this 2-week-course, students were provided with GeoGebra construction activities involving active use of GeoGebra. Meanwhile, control group was taught the same units only in accordance with the curriculum of Ministry of National Education. viAchievement tests prepared for the particular units were administered to both groups as pre-test, post-test and retention tests before and after the activities in class. Data analysis has been conducted through SPSS17.0. Independent sample t-test and paired sample t-test have been used in order to find out the difference between the achievement levels of the groups. As a result of data analysis, GeoGebra was found to affect the achievement and learning of students positively. Moreover, there was significant difference favoring the experimental group according to retention test results. Key Words: Computer-based Teaching, GeoGebra, Transformation Geometry