Survey on the ability of secondary school students in using scientific calculator / Siti Nurleena Abu Mansor, Siti Mariam Saad and Mohd Syafiq Abdul Rahman

Scientific calculator, as one of the education technologies known to many students across countries, is said to give assistances in solving mathematical computation. As a user, the student should have known most of the instructions and functions in the scientific calculator for them to be able to benefit from the device. Data was collected from 56 secondary school students in Pulau Pinang who involved in mathematical seminar. In the seminar, some functions in scientific calculator related to their mathematics syllabus is integrated in solving mathematics questions. 30.4 percent of the students admitted that they did not have proficiency in using scientific calculator and 23 percent of them did not get direct teaching on most calculator functions from their teacher. The students agreed that by using the calculator it helped them in solving the computation quicker and they were more confident in their answer. There was 71.4 percent of students assured that they had improved their ability in using scientific calculator. This study suggests similar calculator seminar being trained to students occasionally as an initiative to support and maximise the use of scientific calculator in mathematics education