Know Abacus

Know Abacus provides users with a digital counting frame. From the app’s home screen, users are shown a list of skills that they can perform using the abacus. When users select a skill, they are presented with both a tutorial for using the abacus to complete the skill and practice problems for the skill selected. If users choose the tutorial, they will be shown examples of how to solve problems related to that skill using the abacus. Then, if the practice problems are selected, users must solve them with the abacus. As users complete the problems, the app automatically records their progress, which users can view with the “Achievement” feature located on this app’s home screen.

Instructional Ideas

1. Teachers can assign students to complete all the practice problems for a specific skill, and teachers can give students a specific amount of time for completion (e.g., a week, two weeks, a month). Teachers can monitor student progress by viewing the “Achievement“ feature.
2. After students become familiar with using the digital abacus in this app, teachers can provide students with a real abacus. Teachers can then give students a problem and watch them solve it using the abacus. Teachers can then ask students if they prefer the digital or real abacus and why. Students can respond either verbally or in writing.
3. Once students are comfortable using the abacus, students can write word problems for their peers to solve. The word problems can be written using the UX Write, Office Offline, or Hanx Writer app. Next, students can email the word problem they wrote to their teacher, and the teacher can post it to a class website. Students will then be able to view the word problems and solve them.
4. Once students deeply understand how to solve problems using the abacus, they can create tutorials for solving problems with the PowerPoint, FlowVella, SlideIdea, or Prezi app. To format these presentations, students can explain the step in text and include pictures demonstrating the step being explained.

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