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Learning Technology publication
of IEEE Computer Society's |
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Volume 10 Issue 1 |
ISSN 1438-0625 |
January 2008 |
Managing 3D Virtual Classrooms
Non-verbal conversational interfaces and feedback
GYM2LEARN – A Web Annotation System for Text
Comprehension
Designing online courses in the light of learning
styles
Using Adobe Acrobat Connect to promote online
community
Creating learning paths in Blackboard Leaning System
Welcome to the January 2008 issue of Learning Technology.
This newsletter focuses on bringing emerging technologies in education to the readers. New developments and practices with learning technologies are the core of this newsletter. This issue covers enhancements on existing course management systems to 3D virtual classrooms.
Antunes et. al. describes a way of monitoring the students’ within a virtual classroom. They discuss a pilot study conduct to identify the key points in tracking students’ activities on formal learning sessions within a virtual classroom. Railean describes issues relating to design problems on non verbal interfaces and the role of feedback. Chiazzese et. al. describes a tool named GYM2LEARN which enables students to annotate web pages. This tool can be used with web based learning tools so that the students can takes notes while learning through the web.
Franco looks at how online courses can be designed taking into account the different learning styles of the students. Schroeder and Tutty looks at the use of Adobe Acrobat Connect tool to promote online community and limit isolation. Veglis describes the new enhanced features in Blackboard Learning System and how they are implemented within the institution.
This newsletter focuses publishing new and emerging technologies in education focussing on advanced learning technologies and its usage in different contexts. Please feel free to bring forward your ideas and views.
Besides, if you are involved in research and/or implementation of any aspect of advanced learning technologies, I invite you to contribute your own work in progress, project reports, case studies, and events announcements in this newsletter. For more details, please refer author guidelines at http://www.ieeetclt.org/content/authors-guidelines.
|
Ali Fawaz
Shareef, PhD Director General Centre for Open Learning Maldives |
Managing 3D Virtual Classrooms
Introduction
Although
online distance learning is not a novel subject, recent emerging technologies
expanded the notion of what a remote virtual learning environment could mean.
One such technology is 3D virtual worlds.
3D virtual
worlds can be described as online, persistent, avatar-based, virtual social
spaces that provide users a sense of immersion and allow the interaction with
other users and the environment. These worlds combine the sense of “being
there”, also found in Virtual Reality (VR) systems. However, VR systems lack
the ability to incorporate several students simultaneously in a learning
situation; they also don't provide students with the communication and user
interaction capabilities available on social environments to foster the
development of collaborative tasks. This ability and capabilities are found in
3D virtual worlds. Some, e.g. Active Worlds[1] and Second Life®[2], also allow the users to create world content,
and furthermore provide the tools to develop novel in-world objects and a
programming API to render possible the development of behaviour-rich content,
tailored to instructional needs. For instance, Dickey [1] presents two case
studies where Active Worlds was used to support synchronous and asynchronous
online learning as well as provide a friendly virtual campus.
Moreover, institutions
may take advantage of these new affordances to provide virtual classrooms that
support integrated synchronous and asynchronous interaction far beyond that
which is traditionally found in asynchronous Course Management Systems (CMS)
and bandwidth-consuming videoconference tools. Since content can be created and
scripted by the users themselves (and not only by specialized content
developers), virtual worlds can be used to implement diverse laboratory
classes. In particular, it can be used in a similar way to traditional
face-to-face computer science programming labs where students’ have to
accomplish a programming assignment.
One issue
that arises is: how can one monitor students inside these virtual classrooms,
in order to better understand their difficulties and plan (and provide)
adequate measures? Several examples, e.g. CourseVis [3] or Moodog [4], can be
found, mostly concerning asynchronous learning supported by CMS. These systems
rely on data collected by CMS to provide instructors with some insights on the
students of the course. On the other hand, Chen [2] presented a system based on
synchronous videoconferencing communication that is able to provide classroom activity
indicators (speaking, making gestures, or moving in their seats) based on each
student’s corporal behaviour.
Though it
is valuable information to know how present systems allow course management and
distant student tracking, more research is required since virtual worlds’
learning affordances do not directly map onto traditional teaching practices.
In order to
better understand how learning activities are performed inside virtual worlds
and how can be managed a pilot study was conducted.
Pilot study
During the
fall semester of 2006, a pilot study was conducted to identify key points about
tracking students’ activities on synchronous formal learning sessions inside
the virtual world of Second Life. Ten first- and second-year computer science
students of the University of Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro (
At the
beginning of the semester, students were given one programming assignment that
should be completed by the end of the semester. Attendance was required once a
week for two-hour synchronous sessions during which teachers would provide
lecture material and students could state their doubts, in order to overcome
their difficulties and misunderstandings. Figure 1 shows one such session.
Students could develop their assignments both during these sessions and beyond
them.
Figure 1 – Example of a
synchronous session.
Students
were asked to develop and script objects in order to accomplish a desired
behaviour. (The image was edited to preserve students’ anonymity.)
Among
others finding, this study showed us Second Life lacks the capabilities to
proper manage instructional related information (e.g. assignments, submissions,
attendance).
We are
currently developing an ongoing project in order to support the management of
student assignments inside virtual worlds that is able to track, store and
reproduce in-world students’ actions. An existing project, Sloodle [5], aims to
give Moodle CMS a 3D representation inside Second Life. Instead of recreating
the same existing features of a CMS inside a virtual world, we are extending
CMS functionality to support the management of synchronous activities inside
virtual worlds and track students’ in-world actions so instructors can have a
detailed view of each student’ path.
References
[1] Dickey, M. (2005). Three-dimensional virtual worlds and distance
learning: two case studies of active worlds as a medium for distance education.
British Journal of Educational Technology. 36 (3). 439-461.
[2] Chen, M. (2003), “Visualizing the pulse of a classroom”, Proc. 11th
ACM International Conference on Multimedia, Berkeley, CA, USA, 555-561
[3] Mazza, R., and Dimitrova, V. (2003). “CourseVis: Externalising
Student Information to Facilitate Instructors in Distance Learning”. In:
U.Hoppe, F. Verdejo, J,. Kay (eds.) Proc. of the International conference in
Artificial Intelligence in Education. Sydney July 20-24. (AIED 2003). IOS
press. pp. 279-286. ISBN 0922-6389.
[4] Zhang, H., Almeroth, K., Knight, A., Bulger, M., and R. Mayer
(2007). "Moodog: Tracking Students' Online Learning Activities", World
Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia & Telecommunications (ED
MEDIA), Vancouver, CANADA June 2007
[5] Kemp, J., Livingstone, D. (2006). “Putting a Second Life
"Metaverse" Skin on Learning Management Systems”. Proceedings of the
Second Life Education Workshop at SLCC, San Francisco, August 2006, pp. 13-18
|
Ricardo
Antunes Escola Superior
de Tecnologia e Gestão de Leiria Morro do
Lena-Alto do Vieiro Apartado 4163 2411-901 Leiria,
Portugal Leonel
Morgado, PhD GECAD – Grupo de
Engenharia do Conhecimento e Apoio à Decisão UTAD, Dep.
Engenharias Apartado 1013 5001-801 Vila
Real, Portugal Paulo
Martins, PhD GECAD – Grupo de
Engenharia do Conhecimento e Apoio à Decisão UTAD, Dep.
Engenharias Apartado 1013 5001-801 Vila
Real, Portugal Benjamim
Fonseca, PhD CETAV – Centro
de Estudos Tecnológicos do Ambiente e da Vida Universidade de
Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro Dep. Engenharias Apartado 1013 5001-801 Vila Real,
Portugal |
Non-verbal conversational interfaces and feedback
Abstract
In this paper, we describe the design problems of the non-verbal conversational interfaces for the electronic textbooks and the role of feedback.
Key words: Conversation, feedback, type
of answer
Introduction
If it is predicting to pass the Turing Test by 2010, we can already have the technology for the analysis of the possible students’ answers. Is it possible to make this concept a reality?
Conversation in the didactical process
In the didactical
process optimal conversation is a“dialogue between teacher and student in the
process of instruction” [1] and represents “a complex dynamic system” [2]. The dialogue
is realized between two partners, in which one is the sender, encoder or
subject (teacher + instructional resources
for teaching) and the second is a receiver, decoder or object (learner + style
and methods of learning). Both partners use language for teaching or learning
realized in two forms: verbal and non-verbal. The verbal conversation is
“conceptual, logically codified, serves for conceptual integration of
information and is semantic” [3], but non-verbal conversation uses images,
mimicry, gestures; logical uncodified language is addressed to affections. In
the electronic textbooks the non-verbal conversation is design through specific
non-verbal conversational interfaces. The main role is given to the electronic
text that can include different font, size, color, diagrams, and tables, audio
and video files and feedback.
From the other point
of view the didactical process can be considered a subsystem of the educational
system in which equilibrium is maintained as the result of two algorithms: the
algorithm of the student activity and the algorithm of the professor activity
[4]. But, “if the whole is at a state of equilibrium, each
part must be in a state of equilibrium in the conditions provided by the other” [5]. So, we can consider the condition of
equilibrium:
where {A} is teacher’s
set and include teacher’ bio-psycho-pedagogical characteristics, instructional
resources, competences, methods of teaching etc.); {B} is student’ set included
student’ bio-psychological characteristics, methods and techniques of learning
etc.
An exchange of
messages is realized between A and B through feedback. The feedback can be
positive or negative, but only the effect of the negative feedback stabilizes
the system. On the other hand, the external factors, which influence the state
of the equilibrium, determine the quality of the input and the needs for
output. In our case (the contemporary didactical process) the input dates are
determined by the psychological characteristics of the native digitals and the
needs for specific technologies for teaching and learning based on new models
and theories (figure 1).
Figure 1. Contemporary didactical process
New forms of the input
and output determine the needs for specific aim and objectives that can be
realized through new instructional and assessment resources (Rt),
methods of teaching (Mt), but also through students’ methods of
learning (Ml) and style of learning (Sl). As a result in
the design of the conversational interfaces a total cumulative effect of
teaching and learning can be considered.
Teacher’ set
The functionalities that
support the learner in the computational didactical process include the
following entities: “Tutor,
Monitor, Fellow Learners, Learning Materials, Informational Sources and Tools”
[6]. In same cases the tutor can be a
human teacher, but in other ones the function of the real teacher can be
included into “intelligent tutoring system” [7], “AutoTutor”[8] or
“e-tutor”[9]. Nevertheless, the tutor’s functions (input dates) correlate with the necessity of the student to be
adaptive to the needs of the external environment (output dates).
“Digital natives” [10]
are included in the contemporary didactical process. As results, the specific
form of the output can be considered the needs of society in “expert
competence” [11] knowledge. This specific form of the output resulted from
specific output dates determines the necessity in new teacher’s resources,
theory and technologies for teaching and learning. One possible solution is
technology that includes behaviorist, cognitive and constructivist methods for
learning in the same didactical process.
Student’ set
Student’ set include
bio-psycho-pedagogical characteristics of the learner. Biological characteristics
of the learner determine the interdependence between the instructional context
and the level of the adaptivity at the environment. Psychological characteristics
correlate with the style of learning. Pedagogical characteristics determine the
effect of formal educational system at the process of learning.
At the moment, intelligent tutoring systems “can support the
student in the process of problem solving, provide intelligent analysis of
problem solution, and construct for each student an individual learning path,
including individual selection of topics to learn, examples, and problems”[12].
Only the effect of the didactical process realized by the computer through
feedback in the design is taken into consideration.
We consider that to be
effective the student can be included into a real personalized process. This
process can be initiated by the teacher (real or virtual), but at the specific
moment the student will have the possibility to be included into self-regulated
process. The specific moment is individual and depends on the student’ bio-psycho-pedagogical
characteristics.
Feedback and the variety of the students’ answer
In the didactical process feedback is a loop between the teacher’s set and student’ set. In comparasion with the traditional learning in computer mediated instruction dialogue is mainly nonverbal. Lets us analyse all possible students answers and the role of feedback using Deatlov and Şerbakova [15] classification of computer didactical tasks (figure2). The author divided all possible students’ answers into elective and constructive forms. Both forms can be observed in sentences, words and symbols and they included 7 types of didactical tasks. Pure elective answers need activities based on remembering and the pure constructive answers – activities based on creating according to Bloom’s taxonomy.
Figure 2. All possible forms of students’
answers
Study the interdependence between the possible students’ answers included into educational software and new terms of the Blooms’ taxonomy defined by Anderson and Krathwohl, 2001 (table 1) their can be observed that task of remembering (type 1 and 6) at each level (sentence, word, symbol) can be easy analysed by the computer program. Type 4 can be programmed and visualized through concept map technique. The solution for all these tasks can be finding into memory of student or in the educational software data base.
Tasks of understanding (type 2, 5 and 7) are more difficult to be solved by the student and analysed by the program as a result of the implication the psychological process (table 1).
Table 1 The dependence between the type of the
didactical task and possible forms of answer
|
|
Type of didactical task |
Possible forms of answer |
|
1 |
Task of remembering |
pure elective – multiple choice answer consisted by words or phrases |
|
2 |
Task of understanding |
formal constructive - summarize of relevance elements using picture |
|
3 |
Task of applying |
elective from set of words – intermediary between sentences, words and symbols, included all possible forms of encoded elements into cognitive schemas |
|
4 |
Task of analyzing |
elective – constructive - for situation where it is possible to group elements encoding into cognitive schemas according to rules |
|
5 |
Task of analyzing |
constructive form consisted by set of words applied for construction the phases with the same meanings. |
|
6 |
Task of evaluating (self-assessment) |
formal elective consisted from selection the specific symbols (logical, mathematical) encoding into cognitive schemas |
|
7 |
Task of creating |
pure constructive combine all possible forms of elements and student’s answer into a functional whole that generate new ideas |
Conclusions and future work
Based on our research,
which indicates that didactical process is a bidirectional conservational
process realized between teacher’s set and student task the article suggest
that in the design of the conversational interfaces a total cumulative effect of
teaching and learning can be considered. Comparative analyse of Bloom’s
taxonomy and Deatlov and
Şerbakova’s classification of
the didactical tasks divided into elective and constructive indicate that low,
intermediary and high level. Low level tasks are based on the memory and can be
easy programmed. Intermediary tasks are based on the memory and thinking
cognitive processes and can be visualized through concept mapping. High level
tasks are based on the thinking and decision-making processes. These tasks are
personalized to the students’ needs and at the moment we didn’t have the
effective intelligent technology for it analyzing.
References
Barnard, Y. (2006). Didactical and
Pedagogical Aspects of e-Learning Tools. In: J.P. Pardillo, Proceedings of the
Proceedings of the Conference on European guidelines for the application of new
technologies for driver training and education,
Madrid, April 25-26, Annex 8. HUMANIST, Universidad, Politécnica de Madrid.
Benjamins, (2003), PACTE “Building a Translation Competence Model”. In: Alves, F. (ed.). Triangulating Translation: Perspectives in Process Oriented Research
Can - Calic В. А. (1979), “The bases of professional – pedagogical conversation” (in Russian), Groznii
Cozarescu M., Cace C., Stefan L. (2003), “Didactical Communication”, (in Romanian) Bucuresti
Denis, B., Watland, P., Pirotte, S. and
Verday, N. (2004), Roles and Competencies of the e-Tutor, Networked Learning Conference
Forehand, M. (2005). Bloom's taxonomy: Original and revised. In M. Orey (Ed.), Emerging perspectives on learning, teaching, and technology.
Graesser, A.C.; Chipman, P., Haynes, B.C.; Olney, A. (2005), AutoTutor: An Intelligent Tutoring System With Mixed-Initiative Dialogueue, Education, IEEE Transactions on Volume 48, Issue 4, Nov. 2005 Page(s): 612 – 618
Heffernan, N. T., Koedinger, K. R. (n.d.) , Intelligent Tutoring Systems are Missing the Tutor: Building a More Strategic Dialogue-Based Tutor, http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~neil/my_papers/postFinal-AAAI+cog-typo.html
Leontiev А. А. (1979), “Pedagogical conversation”(in Russian), Моscow
Prensky M.(2001), Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, On the Horizons, NCB University Press, Vol.9, N5
Railean E., (2006) “The models of
didactıcal process communicatıons in traditional and distance
learning systems: analyses the state of the art”, Turkish Online
Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE July (2006) ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 7
Number: 3 Article: 9
Robers, T. S. (2005), Computer –Supported Collaborative Learning in Higher Education, Idea Group Publishing
Schwarz, E., Brusilovsky,
P. and Weber,
G. (1996), World-Wide Intelligent Textbooks, World Conference on Educational Telecommunications
proceedings (pp. 302-307)
W. Ross Ashby (1999), An Introduction to Cybernetics, Chapman & Hall, London, 1956. http://pcp.vub.ac.be/books/IntroCyb.pdf
Дятлов
B. C.,
Щербакова О. Н.,
Тировые
формы ввода и
анализа
ответов в режиме
автоматизированного
контроля Москва
1975
|
Elena Railean,
PhD University State of
Moldova Department of
Mathematics and Informatics Chisinau, Republic of Moldova Email: raileanu@usm.md |
GYM2LEARN – A Web Annotation System for Text Comprehension
The aim of
this article is to describe Gym2Learn, a web annotation tool for text
comprehension. Interest in this tool developed from the observation that online
study is often limited because browsers are unable to offer students a set of
functionalities to support reading and comprehension activities. As a
consequence, during the last few years, much research has been carried out to
study the possibility of creating innovative and flexible tools that allow
students to actively elaborate the online content.
Gym2Learn
uses an annotation method as a way of applying and controlling some text
comprehension strategies during a web learning activity. The system supports
the student in the three different phases of
assessment, training and execution.
The assessment phase consists of an
online questionnaire to evaluate
students’ metacognitive skills . The
training phase provides a linear hypertext in which the students learn four
comprehesion strategies (recalling previous knowledge; formulating hypotheses
and verifying them during surfing; asking and answering questions to verify
comprehension; identifying important parts of the text) following a
metacognitive approach. The executive
phase allows students to apply cognitive strategies that they have learned
during the training phase and to enrich web pages with annotations. During this
phase, notes are displayed through icons inserted in the portion of hypertext
where a student has used system functionalities, as shown in Figure 1.
Gym2Learn also shows notes in a sidebar arranged by typology. As a consequence,
a student can monitor his work during learning activity.
The sidebar
provides the functionality to create a document in rtf format from the annotations
selected by the students and considered important for their learning
objectives.
Figure 1 – Screenshot of
Gym2Learn system
This phase
is highly relevant because it involves different study strategies (abstraction,
categorization and synthesis) which are typically used in a traditional learning
activity [1]. This phase offers an active role to the student for elaborating
their notes and producing a personal document with the annotated ideas.
The
annotation functionality implemented in the Gym2Learn system is based on a key
issue regarding the term “note”: according to Slotte and Loka [2] and Azouaou
et al [3], a note concerns both the process
of note-taking and the activity which gives rise to the note (product). From this point of view, the
annotation is not simply a way of classifying contents in a specific typology
of note but also corresponds to the behaviour of activating a cognitive
strategy for text comprehension that becomes visible and can be recalled from
the note. While most annotation systems emphasise only the final product of the
annotation process, a note inserted by a student who uses Gym2Learn is at the
same time both the process and product of the application of a cognitive
strategy.
From a
technological point of view the annotation system is modelled as a class of
metadata. For the implementation of this architecture the system adopts the
Annotea server and extends the RDF schema with the introduction of a specific
namespace characterized by 4 types of annotation corresponding to the following
comprehension strategies:
·
previous
knowledge;
·
formulating hypotheses and verifying them during surfing;
·
asking
oneself questions and answering them to verify comprehension;
·
identifying
important parts of the text;
For each
name space, specialized tags were defined to store specific data of every
single type of note. Gym2Learn developed as an extension of the Firefox browser
interacting with the Annotea Server. When the user defines a new annotation, an
RDF [4] fragment is created and sent to the Annotea server. The server replies with
the RDF file with the information requested by the client (Fig. 2).
Figure 2 – Interactions
between clients and the Annotea server
Note
visualization is possible through an XSLT transformation document linked to the
RDF supplied by the Annotea server. Thanks to Javascript and
In
conclusion, the system introduces students to some of the main text
comprehension strategies and allows them to improve their study experience on
the web using a personalized note-taking procedure. In 2007, Gym2Learn was
tested in different kinds of schools. The initial results were promising
because some students improved their metacognitive skills and, moreover, the
tool is flexible and can be effectively adapted to different learning contexts.
The system is currently being tested in high schools in
The
implementation of Gym2Learn is included in the project CORFAD “Centro di
competenza per la promozione e il testing di metodologie e prototipi di
ambienti per l’Orientamento e la Formazione A Distanza”, funded by the Industrial Department through
the European Regional Operational Programme for Sicily 2000-2006.
References
[1] Fundarò, A. (2001). Apprendere ad
apprendere: abilità e tecniche di studio a confronto per il controllo della
comprensione e della conoscenza. Ed.
Carruba, Alcamo.
[2] Slotte, V., Lonka,
K. (2003). Note-taking review – Practical value for learners. Arobase.
Volume 1-2, pp. 79-86.
[3] Azouaou, F., Chen, W. and
Desmoulins, C. (2004). Semantic annotation tools for learning material.
SW-EL’04 (Semantic Web and e-learning workshop), Adaptive Hypermedia (AH’04).
Eindhoven University of
Technology, The Netherlands, pp. 359–364.
[4] RDF/XML Syntax
Specification - http://www.w3.org/TR/rdf-syntax-grammar/
|
Giuseppe Chiazzese Gianluca Merlo Luciano Seta Simona Ottaviano Antonella Chifari Mario Allegra, Giovanni Todaro Ciulla Giuseppe Institute for
Educational Technologies Italian National Research Council of Palermo (Italy) Via Ugo La Malfa 153, 90146 Palermo |
Designing online courses in the light of learning styles
Introduction
No one can
deny the impact of technology upon the field of education. One of these impacts
has been the online medium of delivery of education, often called e-learning,
which can change the way one learns dramatically. However, this also raises
concerns related to the strategies for designing learning environments.
The need to
offer distance learning courses has led to instructional designers rushing to
deliver content through web-based systems and little or no thought has been
given to the quality of this content. The application of technology in
education seems to be ineffective if it purely mimics the traditional
face-to-face classroom. This paper argues that the way forward lies in
addressing different learning styles when developing learning objects. This
belief is consistent with the view expressed by
Learning Styles
Psychologist
Howard Gardner’s work, Multiple
Intelligences (1993), has been effectively used by educators over a number
of years. The successful application of this theory in traditional classroom
environments has paved the way for its application in an online learning
environment. The theory provides instructional designers and e-teachers with a
stimulus for matching technology facilities to learning styles, thus improving
students’ adaptivity to learning systems.
The
aforementioned intelligences are both biological and acquired. Furthermore,
they are capable of changing over time. Human beings possess all of these
intelligences, having some more developed than others. According to
Under no
circumstances, should educators label a student as being only talented in a
certain area. Their role should be of encouraging learners to have their
multiple intelligences developed. Accordingly, web-based activities can serve
this purpose as they offer a rich environment for enabling learners to develop
their capabilities and potentialities.
Learning Objects
The
possibilities for integrating educational technology with multiple
intelligences are various. One example of educational resources being employed
in technology-supported learning is called Learning Objects. The IEEE (2002)
standardization draft defined learning objects as any entity, digital or
non-digital, that may be used for learning, education or training. New Media
Consortium (NMC) defined learning objects as any grouping of materials that are
structured in a meaningful way and are tied to an educational objective
(Johnson, 2003 in Smith, 2004).
There are
various attempts to characterise learning objects, but as the focus of this
paper is on digital learning objects, the definition from Koper (2003) will be
considered most suitable. He refers to learning objects as “units of learning”
defined as digital objects with a specific educational purpose
The process
of development of learning objects, which should aim, first and foremost, at
providing efficient and customised resources, has to take into consideration
primarily the student. Reigeluth (1999) says that apprentices must be at the
top of the instructional structure.
The
implementation of learning objects taking into account the theory of multiple
intelligences provides an environment for the students to exercise their
potentialities, allowing dynamic approaches to be adopted.
Designing
learning objects which can cater for an array of learning styles may sound
daunting but in fact it is far from being an insurmountable task. Backer (2001)
suggests considering eight questions when doing so:
1.
Who are the learners?
(a) What will be the learning outcomes
of the multimedia subject, or course?
(b) What will be the content of the
multimedia, subject, or course?
(c) How will the content be ordered?
(d) What teaching methods/learner
activities will be used?
(e) What media will be used?
(f) How will the learning be assessed?
(g) How will the subject/course be
evaluated for improvement?
Theoretical Foundation
The role of
social interaction in the development of cognition is fundamental for learning
to take place, either in face-to-face or online classroom. For Vygotsky
(1978:57) it was the interaction with teachers or peers that allowed students
to advance.
The
Vygotskian theory of zone of proximal development, i.e. the distance between
what students could accomplish by themselves and what they could accomplish
when assisted by others, enables us to understand how socioconstructivist
environments can provide fruitful learning opportunities. E-learners stand to benefit
from the sociocultural approach, because it is through interaction with peers
or teachers that they can develop understanding. Researchers have found that
online discussions provide the conditions for students to practice their
literacy skills in a non-threatening environment (Colomb & Simutis, 1996).
Nonlinearity
Technology-enhanced
environments based on the constructivist models are amenable to a
student-centred approach, mainly with the development of hypertext[3] and hypermedia[4], creating a non-linear
mode of instruction. Therefore, such environments provide should permit
learners with opportunities to create their own learning (Mergel, 1998).
As opposed
to traditional text, information within a hypertext may be retrieved in a
sequence specified by each user. Shapiro and Niederhauser (2003:605)
state that there is a greater degree of learner control when engaged in
hypertext-assisted learning (HAL).
Collaborative Learning
A
successful online learning experience is also promoted when it is
student-centred and focuses on collaborative work by fostering a sense of
community and collaboration in the classroom (KAHMI-STEIN, 2000; PLASS &
CHUN, 1996). Learning at a pace that meets the needs of the learner enables
them to become more active in their learning. Jonassen, Carr, and Yueh
(1998:13) regard learners as actively engaged in interpreting the external
world and reflecting on their interpretations in the sense that they must participate
and interact with the surrounding environment in order to create their own view
of the subject.
According
to Larsen-Freeman (2000:164), cooperative or collaborative learning essentially
involves students learning from each other in groups. But it is not the group
configuration that makes cooperative learning distinctive; it is the way that
students and teachers work together that is important.
In
collaborative learning environments, students have the chance to learn
cooperatively, which allows the members of a community of learners to be able
to teach each other something in a learner-centred fashion. Effective learning
experiences are created when each group member is encouraged to feel
responsible for participating and for learning. Learners’ level of motivation
is high and leadership is distributed, as they share experiences and solve
problems.
Autonomy
Given the
fact that constructive online environments enhance learning, in the sense that
learners play an active part in their own learning, being able to make
appropriate decisions, they start to gain higher degrees of autonomy.
Freire
(1997) understands autonomy as the learner’s capacity and freedom to construct
and reconstruct the taught knowledge.
From the
moment students have achieved autonomous learning, they are able to decide
which learning objects will facilitate learning and attend to their needs. By
using online search engines such as Google,
they can choose from a wide range of learning objects available.
Conclusion
The main
concern must be not to simply reproduce traditional methods in an online
learning environment. In doing so, one may run the risk of restricting the
number of learners whose learning styles will be taken into account. Kaminski
(2002:7) reiterates this idea in:
“Specific
attention must be given to online student learning styles. The opportunities
extended by distance education cannot be taken advantage of if, during
implementation, they replicate the problems found in traditional classrooms”.
Technology-enhanced
learning environments will only realize their potential if they provide
learners with the necessary tools to become responsible for their own learning.
In the long run, if due consideration is given to employing a flexible,
adaptive, student-centred, non-linear, personalised, interactive and
collaborative web-based learning system, the learning experience will be more
likely to result in successful learning outcomes.
References
Backer, P. (2001)
Instructional design for multimedia and the WWW.
Colomb, G. & Simutis, J. A. (1996) Visible conversation and academic inquiry: CMC in a culturally
diverse classroom. S. C. Herring (Ed.), Computer-mediated communication:
Linguistic, social, and cross-cultural perspectives. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
FREIRE, P. (1997) Pedagogia da Autonomia. Rio de Janeiro: Paz e Terra.
GARDNER, H.
(1993) Multiple Intelligences: The Theory in Practice. New York: Basic Books.
GARDNER, H.
(1999) Intelligence Reframed: Multiple Intelligences for the 21st Century.
New York: Basic Books.
GARDNER, H.
(2003) Multiple Intelligences After Twenty Years. Invited Address, American
Educational Research Association.
Garland, D., Martin, B. N. (2005) Do gender and
learning style play a role in how online courses should be designed? Journal of
Online Interactive Learning.
Jonassen, D. H., Carr, C., Yueh, H. P. (1998) Computers as mindtools for engaging
learners in critical thinking. TechTrends, 43(2), p. 24-32.
Kahmi-Stein, L. D. (2000) Looking to the future of
TESOL teacher education: Web-based bulletin board discussions in a methods
course. TESOL Quarterly, 34, p. 423-455.
Kaminiski, C.
(2002) Formative use of select-and-fill-in concept maps in online instruction:
Implications for students of different learning styles. Proceedings of the
Association for the Education of Teachers in Science Conference.
KOPER, R.
(2003) Combining reusable learning resources and services with pedagogical
purposeful units of learning. Reusing
Online Resources. Kogan Page, London.
Larsen-Freeman,
D. (2000) Techniques and Principles in Language Teaching. 2nd ed.,
Oxford University Press.
Mergel, B. (1998) Instructional
design and learning theory. Professional and Theoretical Issues in Educational
Technology: Occasional Papers.
PAIVA,
V.L.M.O, (2005). Autonomy
and complexity
http://www.veramenezes.com/autmy.htm
Plass, J. & Chun, D. (1996) A hypermedia system for CALL in a networked environment. M. Warschauer
(Ed.), Telecollaboration in foreign language learning, p. 83-103. Honolulu:
University of Hawaii Press.
Reigeluth, C. M.
(1999) Instructional-design theories and models. Volume II. Lawrence Erlbaum
Associates.
SMITH, R.
S. (2004) ‘Guidelines For Authors Of Learning Objects’. New Media Consortium, McGraw-Hill Education.
Shapiro, A., & Niederhauser, D. (2003) Learning from hypertext: Research
issues and findings. D. H. Jonassen (Ed.). Handbook of Research for Education
Communications and Technology, 2nd ed. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Vygotsky, L.S.
(1978) Mind in Society - the Development of Higher Psychological Processes.
Harvard University Press, Cambridge.
|
Claudio de Paiva Franco EFL teacher Cultura Inglesa - Duque de Caxias, Brazil. Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. E-mail: cpaivafranco@yahoo.com.br |
Using Adobe Acrobat Connect to promote online community
Introduction
Online
learning offers many challenges yet many opportunities. One of the challenges
is creating an environment where students feel less isolated and more a part of
a community of learners. Emergent communication technologies have increased the
ability to more closely mimic a face-to-face environment in online courses.
This paper presents the experience of adopting a new technology to support an
online learning environment.
Adobe Acrobat Connect
Faculty members and staff in the Department of Educational Technology (EDTECH) at Boise State University recently sought to enhance their capability to deliver engaging, flexible online learning environments, to enhance the learning experience. Adobe Acrobat Connect (Connect) is one of the technologies the EDTECH department selected for this purpose. While not without its technical difficulties, Connect has become an essential component in the endeavors to create an online community of learners and to design and deploy effective and efficient alternatives for learning online. Not only do students experience engaging, convenient instruction through on-demand multimedia presentations and synchronous interactions, but they also use these tools for their own communication needs and demonstration of learning. Thus, students become more engaged, proactive learners in an environment that encourages creativity and independence.
EDTECH faculty use Acrobat Connect Meeting and Presenter in ways that enhance their particular courses. Instructors host meetings for various purposes, such as an enhanced lecture with accompanying PowerPoint presentations, polling for feedback, and files for sharing and downloading by students. The use of webcams make the experience as close to real as possible, reducing the sense of distance commonly experienced by online students. Participants view other students’ work using the screen sharing application. Instructors meet one-on-one with students as they progress through a project, or use Acrobat Connect Meeting for virtual office hours, being available in the room and notified by either a student’s voice or text upon student entry into the room. Posted virtual meeting days and times provide students with the convenience of knowing when an instructor will be available for online contact. And provide asynchronous opportunities for participation by recording live sessions.
Connect presentations are used by the EDTECH department to introduce course syllabi, to enhance course content, to further explain difficult concepts, to discuss a course module or lesson, to deliver a quiz, to customize a lesson for an individual student, to prepare a student slideshow as a course introduction, or to simply provide information in a more interactive, informative environment. See figure 1.
Figure 1. Presentation in Adobe Acrobat Connect
Students also create Acrobat Connect presentations as assignments, projects, or as an alternative method of presenting content in many EDTECH classes. Once they are trained in how to produce Acrobat Connect Presentations, they seem to enjoy creating and viewing them. In many online courses, students have options to produce multimedia projects or other ways of expressing a concept or problem. Creating and publishing an Connect presentation offers them a challenging, creative, and aesthetically pleasing way to complete these assignments. Since students also can publish directly to the Connect server from their PowerPoint program, the step of transferring the files to a server is eliminated, with the link automatically being provided, saving them time in the process.
Conclusion
While Acrobat Connect has certainly simplified many processes and enabled both faculty and students to contribute to and design powerful learning enhancements, it has also created more work, for network administration, faculty, and students. Therefore, in order to use Acrobat Connect to its full potential, an organization must be committed to the criteria that will ensure success in an online program.
From our experience, perhaps the most critical prerequisite in the successful development of online learning community is an environment of respect, where experimentation and failure go hand-in-hand. Not all software tools will work as envisioned and not all courses will benefit from the use of certain tools. Experimentation has continued to play an important role in the use and development of Adobe Acrobat Connect, by both faculty and students in the EDTECH department. Problems are something to expect and work through. And while it is essential to experiment with technology, we should examine our purposes in using the technology if it does not work as expected or promised. It is imperative that we keep striving to improve each student’s learning experience, while maintaining an equilibrium that will promote the use and exploration of technology with the right to not use it at times.
References
Adobe Acrobat Connect: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobatconnect/
Educational Technology Boise State University: http://edtech.boisestate.edu
|
Barbara Schroeder, Ed.D. Boise State University Jeremy I. Tutty, Ph.D. Boise State University |
Creating learning paths in Blackboard Leaning System
Introduction
Today Course Support
Environments or Course Management Systems (CMSs) are frequently employed in
order to supplement conventional face to face courses or to support a distance
learning program (Collis, 1999; Veglis, 2005;Veglis, 2002;Copinga et al. 2000). Since the beginning of 1998, the Media
Informatics Laboratory of the Department of Journalism & Mass Communication
(J&MC), at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (AUTh),
Course structure
Creating an online course where users spend their time engaged in learning and interaction relies on establishing a course structure where content is easy to identify, navigation is intuitive, and tool placement fits in logically with the course design. But organizing all the elements in such an online course depends on the resources that are offered by the CMS.
The previous version of Blackboard allowed the educator to create a lesson or a series of courses that students can access sequentially (based on chronological order) or directly (a student may be interested only for a particular course) (Veglis, 2006). In each course the educator was able to organize his material in folders in the same way as in the local disk. The problem is that we were not able to insert hyperlinks from one file to another. Thus the students can access the content only by following the organization of the site, based on the navigational structure that the CMS offers.
New features
The ways
that course content is presented to students reflects the teaching style of the
educator, the organization of the material to be covered in the class and the
objectives for mastery of that material. Blackboard 7.1 allows educators to
choose a method of organization that best fits the goals of the course, while
keeping in mind the ways that students will navigate through the course to find
content and how they will utilize materials and tools. The new version of
blackboard includes many ways to present content to students in a course.
Presentation of content can be linear, it can be interconnected like the Web,
or reflect a combination of formats. There are three tools that allow the
educator to organize the course content:
Learning Units
Adaptive Release
Course links
The above
tools aide in controlling the flow of material to students and provide a
customized learning environment based on the organization of the course, the
assessment of student skills, participation, and achievement.
Learning Units
Learning Units, which were also available in the previews
version of the platform, are employed in order to present multiple content
items in a single package of information. The difference between a Learning Unit and a Folder, from the student perspective, is that each item in a Learning Unit is displayed on its own
page with navigation to the other items, whereas items in a Folder are all displayed vertically on
one page. The Learning Unit may be
set to enforce a sequential view of the content for guiding learning, or allow
users to explore the unit freely using the table of contents that is
automatically generated when the learning
unit is created. Students enter courses with different sets of skills,
learning styles and experiences that impact their ability to achieve mastery of
course objectives (Blackboard official site http://www.blackboard.com).
Customizing Adaptive Release of Content
Adaptive Release of Content
Custom
learning paths through course content and activities can be created using Adaptive Release of Content. Content
items, discussions, assessments, assignments, or other activities can be
released to students based on a set of criteria including:
·
date/time,
·
username,
·
group
membership,
·
grade
or attempt on a particular Gradebook item,
·
review
of another content item.
For
example, tests in a classroom situation are typically used as means of
controlling the release of content. New material is not presented to students
until they have been assessed on their mastery of the preceding material. Adaptive Release can be used in on
online course to require that students meet an assessment goal before they are
allowed to move on to the next unit. Another example of Adaptive Release is setting the criteria based on the Review Status
tool. Students must mark as reviewed a document listing a set of rules for
using the Discussion Board before a link to the Discussion Board is released to
them and they are allowed to post (Blackboard official site
http://www.blackboard.com).
Course links
Content items can be joined together using internal links to
reinforce concepts stimulate communication and connect assessments with other
course tools, material, and achievements. Placing Course Links on content pages can help direct students to other
relevant course materials and streamline course navigation. Inserting Tool Links within content paths
encourages participation at relevant points in the course. Used in conjunction
with Learning Units and Adaptive Release, strategically placed
links to other content items, gives the educator control over how students
experience the course and guides them through material so that they can build
knowledge and skills in logical pathways to achieve course objectives and
master the offered material (Blackboard official site http://www.blackboard.com).
Conclusions
The
combination of the previews mentioned tools gives the educator the ability to
easily construct or alter learning paths. Future extension of this work will
include evaluation of these tools from the students’ point of view.
References
Collis, B. (1999).
Applications of Computer Communications in Education: An Overview, IEEE Communications Magazine, Vol.
37, No. 3, 82-86.
Copinga, G., Verhaegen, M., and M. van de Ven, (2000).
Toward a Web-Based Study Support Environment for Teaching, IEEE Control Systems Magazine, Vol.
20, No. 4, 8-19.
Veglis, A. (2000).
Design of a Web-Based Interactive Computer Lab Course, in Proc. 10th Mediterranean
Electrotechnology Conference (MELECON 2000), Cyprus, Vol. I, 302-305.
Veglis, A. (2002). Web
based teaching systems, IEEE Distributed Systems on Line, April 2002.
http://dsonline.computer.org/portal/site/dsonline/menuitem.9ed3d9924aeb0dcd82ccc6716bbe36ec/index.jsp?&pName=dso_level1&path=dsonline/0204/departments&file=edu_print.xml&xsl=article.xsl&
Veglis, A.
(2005). Adding content in Course Support Environments, IEEE Learning Technologies, Vol 7, Issue 3,
July 2005, pp. 46-48.
http://lttf.ieee.org/learn_tech/issues/july2005/index.html
Veglis, A. (2006).
“Embedding and formatting content in Course Management Systems”, WSEAS
Transactions on Advances in Engineering Education, Issue 5, Volume 3, May,
pp.396-402.
|
Andreas Veglis Media Informatics
Lab. Dept of Journalism & MC Aristotle GREECE |