The Effect of Peer Collaboration with ViLLE on Success in Financing Mathematics

In this paper, we describe how collaborative use of an electronic assessment tool improves students’ learning results in Financing Mathematics in higher education. Financing Mathematics was taught as part of the Business Mathematics course in the first year studies for Bachelor’s degree students in the International Business program at Turku University of Applied Sciences. The assessment was carried out with the collaborative educational tool ViLLE. The Business Mathematics course consists of Business Statistics and Financing Mathematics. The Financing Mathematics course component was used for the purpose of this research. In the Business Statistics course component, the students worked independently, whereas in Financing Mathematics, the students also worked in pairs with the tool. The independently working students formed the control group and the students working in pairs formed the treatment group in this quasi-experimental study. The paper reveals that students working in pairs with the ViLLE tool achieved better exam results than the students working independently. This finding is in agreement with the findings of similar research studies on programming. The collaboration between students seems to be the key reason for the better results of the students working in pairs in this paper.