Bouck, E. (2010). Does type matter: Evaluating the effectiveness of four-function and graphing calculators . Journal of Computers in Mathematics and Science Teaching , 29 (1), 5–17. https://www.aace.org/pubs/jcmst/

[no doi located]; Also accessible through ERIC online database: https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ881590

Two types of calculator, four-function calculator or graphing calculator, were investigated. About half of the participants were randomly assigned to receive one or the other calculator option.

A total of 108 8th-grade students from four schools / eight classrooms in one region of a state (Indiana, U.S.) participated, including students with disabilities and students without disabilities. Of the 25 students with disabilities, 16 had learning disabilities, 4 had emotional/behavioral disabilities, 3 had attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and 1 student was identified as other health impaired (OHI). Data on ethnicity and sex were also reported.

The dependent variables included pre- and post-tests of mathematics items aligned to state standards and specific to the number and operations strand of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) 2000 standards. Additional data were gathered from students with a calculator use survey.

Students with disabilities and students without disabilities performed equally well in both accommodations conditions, meaning that students with disabilities did not receive a differential impact or boost from the accommodations. Further, neither accommodation benefited either group in an enhanced manner over the other. Additionally, students with and students without disabilities reported through the survey that they had similar calculator use and preference patterns, except that students with disabilities tended to use calculators routinely on tests than did students without disabilities.