did not lose her motivation, although there were
several coding mistakes. Thanks to her, we were also
able to code some different kinds of solution methods,
which had not been anticipated by the teachers in
engineering. As mentioned previously, there is
usually not just one correct method to solve a problem
in mathematics.
There are several possible reasons for a low
commitment to the course. In general, the completion
rate of MOOCs has been known to be weak (Alraimi
et al., 2015); self-paced MOOCs especially appear to
have low retention rates (Ihantola et al., 2020). In our
MOOC, over half of the enrolled students did not
even start the course. Of the 12 students that joined
the MOOC platform, only a few, in fact, solved
anything, and we suspect that most of them just joined
the course to get access to material. However, the
COVID-19 pandemic might have affected behaviour
in the course in many ways. Because of the pandemic,
the upper secondary school students thought that they
could not get any summer jobs in 2020 and enrolled
in this course to at least promote their studies. The
situation was surprisingly better than assumed, and
jobs became available, although later than normally.
Another pandemic-related explanation is that because
the students were studying online several months
during spring 2020, they had become restless with
online study and wanted a break from it. In any case,
we need to study this situation more.
To better understand the situation and student
experiences with the MOOC and to develop the
exercises and materials further, we are currently
collecting feedback with a form linked to the MOOC.
The feedback is provided anonymously, and it can be
targeted either to specific exercises or the course in
general. In the future, we are hoping to be able to
translate the course into English and Russian, as there
are two special upper secondary schools in our area.
The correct feedback is important part of a good
online exercise (Mäkelä et al, 2016), and especially if
feedback is automated. If a student feels positive and
encouraged after feedback, it may affect positively in
motivation and in engaging their studies (Kennette &
Chapman, 2021). Therefore, we collect students’
observations of cases where the feedback should be
improved to encourage instead of discouragement.
4 CONCLUSION
The worry of low interest in mathematics seems to be
worldwide (Yeh & al., 2019, Azmidar & al., 2017). If
the connection to one’s own life cannot be captured,
the interest is unlikely to arise. Like Legault (2016)
mentions, the inner interest arise motivation and will
to progress. The mathematics teacher of 2020 in
Finland Piia Haapsaari, who was selected by
mathematics teachers’ union MAOL, mentions that
she thought as a teenager not to be good enough in
mathematics. A good teacher and appropriate
teaching methods opened the lock: the success in
given tasks increased the inner interest
(https://esaimaa.fi/uutiset/kotimaa/33d7a047-b57a-
4bec-af99-f4495a0bb901).
Based on the feedback we have received at the
project steering group meetings and teacher webinars,
local upper secondary teachers are excited about this
course and material, want to learn more about it and
want to offer it to students. Of course, the demand for
upper secondary schools to cooperate with higher
education from fall 2021 forward helps us as well.
When this cooperation really starts, we will be able to
better see how much students are able to utilise the
course. One definite challenge is the already packed
upper secondary school curriculum and the resulting
heavy timetable of students, which may result in
reluctance to engage in any non-compulsory activities.
As both, contextual framing and use of modern
technology in the teaching of mathematics are
complex issues with positive and negative aspects,
the evaluation of the effect of MOOC on student
motivation must be carefully planned and executed.
We have started this work by establishing feedback
channels to the students and teachers, but more and
more versatile data is needed for proper data
triangulation and analysis. This is an essential part of
future work in the project.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We thank European Social Fund for funding this
project (S21637).
REFERENCES
Alraimi, K., Zo, H., & Ciganek, A. (2015). Understanding
the MOOCs continuance: The role of openness and
reputation. Computers & Education 80, 28-38.
Azmidar, A., Darhim, D., & Dahlan, J. (2017). Enhancing
Students' Interest through Mathematics Learning.
International Conference on Mathematics and Science
Education .
Beswick, K. (2011). Putting Context in Context: An
Examination of the Evidence for the Benefits of
'Contextualised' Tasks. International Journal of
Science and Math Education 9, 367-390.