December 9, 2010
By Richard McCormack

The Nokia MoMaths project is set to change the educational landscape and close the distance learning digital divide by giving SA learners affordable 24/7 access to maths tuition on their mobile phones accessible anytime and anywhere.

Nokia first launched the MoMaths project in conjunction with the Department of Education, MXit, Cell C, MTN and textbook publishers Maskew Miller Longman in 2009, the project is supported by the SAFIPA partnership. 260 learners in Gauteng, the North West and the Western Cape provinces, who formed part of a test project, were encouraged to use their own handsets to access the collaborative learning service for mathematics via MXit.

The second pilot project , currently underway until the end of 2010 has shown even more impressive results by boosting the competency of both teachers and pupils in the onsite schools and showing enormous potential for the future. 4,000 Learners from North West, Eastern Cape and Western Cape provinces participated in the 2010 project.

Results from the 2010 project has shown a 14 percent rise in maths competency with 82 percent of learners using their mobile maths tuition application outside of school hours, during holidays and weekends.

Phase two of the project is being conducted with 4000 learners and 72 teachers in 30 schools spread across three provinces. The application is again using MXit for the children to test and practice their maths skills and collaborate and compete with their friends to work out syllabus maths problems.

According to Riitta Vanska, project manager for the initiative and senior manager  mobile and learning solutions in Sustainability operations at Nokia “Most learners do not have access to computers however many of them do have access to a mobile phone. The  initiative gives Grade 10 learners the opportunity to study mathematics anywhere and anytime which in turn gives them the chance to empower themselves.”

Both Cell C and MTN are currently sponsoring the project which enables children to access the mobile maths program for FREE whenever they like. Results have shown the collaborative networking format of the maths application on MXit encourages the children to learn proactively through maths exercises and examples and encourages them to excel by competing with each other on test scores and mobile competency rankings.

Case study results have shown teachers are also assisted by the program because they can immediately see where their class’s weak points lie and boost their competency by encouraging the learners to break maths problems down through mobile maths exercise tuition and repetition until full comprehension and competency is achieved.

The program currently has over 10 000 different maths exercises covering all aspects of the maths syllabus.

Nokia and its partners are currently evaluating the results and findings from the project and looking at options and channels to roll out the mobile maths project across schools throughout the country and significantly boost maths competency for learners across SA.