Game Constraints, Player Verbalizations, and Mathematics Learning
In two phases (clinical and empirical) the effects of game constraints on the quantity and quality of mathematical verbalizations during game playing and on the amount of student learning were examined. Subjects were 114 fourth- and fifth-grade students. During the clinical phase, small groups of students were videotaped while playing mathematics games. Alternating some game constraints seemed to alter both the quantity and quality of verbalizations. For selected variations of game constraints found during the clinical phase to affect verbalizations, four small pretest-posttest experiments indicated no achievement effects.