Using Serious Games with Exploratory Teaching to Develop Mental Arithmetic in Primary Education

Background/purpose. This article aims to analyze the use of serious games from the Hypatiamat Platform to promote mental arithmetic in a first-grade primary school class in an Exploratory Teaching environment. Materials/methods. This study is mixed, interpretative, and action-research in design. It quantitatively analyses the students' Level of Knowledge and Global Performance and uses multimodal narratives to explain the data in Detail. Results. The results show that using Serious Games from the Hypatiamat Platform through Exploratory Teaching favored student learning. There was a significant improvement in the students' Level of Knowledge and Global Performance and an increase in student motivation and involvement. Conclusion. It is concluded that the adequate integration of serious games through Exploratory Teaching created a motivating and challenging learning environment for the students. This approach promoted greater active participation and involvement in 1st-grade primary school students and contributed to a significant improvement in their mental arithmetic development. Serious Games must be integrated into the classroom in an appropriate way to favor the learning of mathematics. We suggest integration through Exploratory Teaching so that students develop essential skills and improve their learning.