Functions Fun: An iPad Educational Game for Teaching Mathematical Functions and Graphs

Teaching and learning mathematical functions and graphs pose significant challenges for teachers and students. Students often have difficulty in understanding a functional relationship between two quantities such as distance and time, temperature and precipitation, and gas price and number of gallons. Teaching students to have quantitative thinking about functions can help them understand the rate of change for complicated functions and later succeed in learning Calculus. Traditional educational methods such as static graph images and some learning tools usually have some limitations. Teaching students the dynamic changes of quantities within the static picture has serious difficulties. Compared to the learning tools, the game-based learning increases interest when students are learning complicated functions. This thesis presents a game-based learning application called Functions Fun, which runs on iPad tablet computers. The game is created to teach / learn the following functions: Linear, Quadratic, Exponential, Logarithmic, Trigonometric, and Polynomial with degrees over four. Each function is covered under a game level. The game setting is a jungle environment. Each game level has its own scene, challenging the player to take an action while teaching a function and its graphical representation. Functions Fun enables students to play and learn functions and graphs in a more effective and entertaining manner.