Aug
31
The meta-LAM dashboard for teachers was developed to provide teachers information of the students actions taken in the games and mini-games in the BEACONING platform. The dashboard was developed to meet the specific needs of BEACONING including games and mini-games structure and location-based activities. The dashboard definition is based on two previous concepts: the Learning Analytics Model (LAM) and the meta-LAM.
The Learning Analytics Model (LAM) describes which data is to be collected for a particular educational videogame and how this data should be processed, reported, and interpreted. A complete LAM definition includes specifying the learning goals, game goals, traces to be sent, analysis model, visualizations and alerts and warnings if needed. For more details about the Learning Analytics Model, see the blog post about it.
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Aug
28
Sam Harper (HWU), Theo Lim (HWU) and Jannicke Baalsrud Hauge (BIBA) presented different Beaconing project results at ASME 2018 IDETC/CIE in Quebec, Canada on August, 26-29. Theo Lim and Jannicke Baalsrud Hauge participated in the panel discussion on advancements and enhanced integration of digital technology systems, VR applications, CPS-Systems and tools for design engineering and presented there their recent findings out of the Beaconing project in this field.
Sam Harper went more into detail and presented HWUs VET game (paper DETC2018-8532)in his presentation “Control-Display Affordance in simulation Based Education). The work has been carried out in collaboration with Sams research group at HWU and is the start of his PhD research.
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Aug
10
Abstract Thanks to its non-linearity and to its hypertext structure, multimedia has the learning advantage of being flexible and scalable. Thanks to its free browsing, to its authentic and visual wealths and to the numerous point of view it allows, digital adds several new learning scopes. A history teacher can now supply his lesson with an infinite number of references and share them instantly on a digital platform. A language teacher can now encourage students to improve their skills outside the class. What are those new learning tools revolutionizing teaching? New technologies have crossed our houses, our offices, our services, and have finally reached our schools. Now, it is uncommon for a teacher to provide lesson to his class without a computer on his desk. Sometimes, some of them even desert their classroom to give these new distance lessons we call e-learning. Indeed, this new learning model offers the indisputable strength of flexibility. Now, student can choose what, when and how he wants to learn. However, distance-learning cannot certainly answer a question as quick as a physically present teacher. So how to combine both? Do teachers enjoy same benefits that e-learning offers? Several recent digital projects give an idea about what classroom of the future would look like. ClassDojo: turn class into community While internet allows people to instantly interact whatever the distance between them, some schools took the decision to improve communication inside and outside the classroom through a new digital model. ClassDojo, an educational communication application, is based on interaction between teacher, students and parents during the class. The tool includes a Facebook-like timeline which allows to communicate through texts, pictures and videos. That way, doting parents can follow their children during the eight-hour length scholar day.The application also highlights a points system in which a student can be rewarded with one “working hard” point, or one “living” point, depending on one of 7 behavior categories. ClassDojo finally proposes several activities to encourage students to debate. It is based on a user-friendly design to save teachers time. No data entry are required. The program has already been tested in 70% of British schools, according to ClassDojo, but data are too recent to be studied. Even if testing are still ongoing, ClassDojo showed how gamification can serve to engage users as a community. Documentary-learning Educ’Arte Recent studies showed that video is growing significantly in classrooms. Video appears as an efficient way to share knowledges because it is the first form of entertainment for youths today. It also encourages speaking at school owing to its sound features. However, teachers mainly use video subjectively and for any reasons which makes its usage at school quite confusing.The franco-german tv channel Arte, specialized in documentaries, just launched an interactive VOD platform to schools: Educ’Arte. The video library has more than 800 documentaries classified in several categories depending on the discipline and the academic level. Besides struggling against illegal streaming, Arte wants to give students and teachers access to culture numerically through a playful educational tool. Educ’Arte offers a range of features for the teacher to adapt documentaries to his lessons such as video editing, quiz editing and lesson plans. Students can also use mind-mapping shareable with the whole class.
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Aug
9
McKinsey education researchers have applied “advanced analytics and machine learning”, on PISA 2015 data and “have identified factors that play a critical role in student achievement.” The PISA assessment programme of OECD has become an international benchmark of educational achievement at nations level. In 2015 it covered more than half a million students in 72 countries. Data from PISA is extremely valuable for researchers because it goes beyond the assessment scores and includes answers of a series of questions to students, principals, teachers, and parents about their practice, attitudes, behaviors, and resources. McKinsey researchers have derived 2 major findings:
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Aug
8
Abstract While the whole world cheers continuously the incredible properties of gamification, it might be great to enquire about serious game failures. Those which didn’t stay the course compared with the heavyweights of the market. What are those games dead the first day of their release as a result of violent reviews from unsatisfied players? Hard to say. For all that, let us evaluate the different pitfalls that a serious game risks to encounter. In the last ten years, serious games turned out as an effective remedy against the problems of education, learning, management, information and prevention. A study from the cabinet Market&Market estimated that the market of Serious Game is going to know an annual growth rate about 16 % by 2020. The game-based learning market revenue worldwide reached 3 billions U.S. dollars in 2017. However, it is hard to estimate its efficiency and its quality. Very often, the client company who ordered a serious game releases it internally only. Because of this, it will be impossible for you to find an article describing how a serious game flopped after its release. Then, can serious game really boast of being a miracle cure? No need to mention that the answer is obviously “No”. Then, it is certainly better to expound all the traps and the pitfalls which risk to depict serious game for what it is not and for what it does not allow. It should be made clear to ask the question about relevance for such a learning model.
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