The study aimed to investigate Ethiopian university lecturers’ readiness to use technology for teaching mathematics at the tertiary level during the COVID-19 pandemic when they were compelled to adapt to distant education. Using Google Forms, online questionnaires were distributed to 41 lecturers in three Ethiopian universities, of whom eighteen participated. Before the research, the questionnaire was piloted with eight lecturer participants to categorise questions and validate the instrument using the Rasch measurement model. The questionnaire was locally developed based on guidelines from the literature. It purposed to investigate university lecturers’ individual preparedness for technological instruction in terms of their knowledge, beliefs and current, and historical exposure to this mode of instruction. As a counterbalance, some circumstantial factors influencing their readiness were investigated too. Lecturers’ optimistic beliefs about using educational technologies have been found to contrast with some disabling circumstantial factors. This study revealed that the lecturers were generally able and interested in integrating technology into the teaching process but that barriers, primarily at the institutional level, hindered them from doing so. In addition to the technologies suggested in the questionnaire, participants enriched the research findings by adding more possible technologies that lecturers may use for educational purposes. The data was analysed using WINSTEPS (Student Version of WINSTEPS 4.7.0.0) and SPSS version 20. The results showed the reliability of using the instrument was 0.77 based on Cronbach’s alpha. The PT-measure correlation value determined the construct validity (PMC), ranging from 0.23 to 0.71 except item PUT15’s infit and outfit MNSQ between 0.1 to 1.86 and ZSTD range -1.05 to 1.61, which was acceptable. The fit statistics showed that the person separation index, 1.97, was considered good and that the item separation index, 0.63 was within an acceptable range. Person and item reliability were at 0.8 and 0.28, respectively. The result indicated that the new instrument with five items after eliminating unfit items (such as items FAT19, PTT10, KDT1, PTT8 and PTT 12) was reliable and valid to measure the use of technology in the teaching and learning process of the university lecturers.
Learners in the 21st century need technological support in the learning process because of the advancements made in technology for teaching and learning. A GeoGebra-oriented classroom uses one of these technologies that can be implemented in the classroom. The new developed cycle model implemented in the study and explored the effect of using GeoGebra mathematical software on students' perceptions to using GeoGebra software to learn calculus. A mixed research methodology was employed. In the quantitative part of the study, a closed-ended questionnaires were used by clustering into themes and interview for the qualitative part of the study. The study was conducted at a university in Ethiopia that lasts for four weeks, and the university was selected purposively. The quantitative data were analyzed using SPSS version 27 while the qualitative data were coded into themes and analyzed using computer software ATLAS.ti 9. Students expressed positive perceptions towards the use of GeoGebra for learning differential calculus and 74% of students were satisfied with the preferences of the GeoGebra lesson-oriented course offered in the study while 70% were also interested in scaffolding activities and activities included in the developed model during interventions.
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