Learning Through Simulation: Understanding Project Failure and Escalation

1. Increasing student interaction in learning activities: Using a simulation to learn about project failure and escalation 指導教授：Chen, Ming-puu 報 告 者：Tsai, Yu-ting 報告日期：2006/10/17 Nulden,U. & Scheepers,H. (2002). Increasing student interaction in learning activities: Using a simulation to learn about project failure and escalation.Journal of Information Systems Education, 12(4), 223-232

2. 1.Introduction • Participation in an unsuccessful or even in a failing project can have a positive learning outcome for the participants. It provides the participants with a chance to learn from their mistakes and thus minimises the risk of making similar mistakes in the future (Ewusi-Mensah and Przasnyski, 1995). • In order to be more successful, professionals should learn from experiences and be able to rethink and improve their practice (Senge, 1990).

3. 1.Introduction • The PIER approach: • Problem based learning (PBL) • Interactive learning • Experiential learning • Role play

4. 2.The PIER approach • Problem based learning (PBL) • a way of constructing and teaching courses using problems as the stimulus and focus for student activity. It is not simply the addition of problem-solving activities to otherwise discipline centred curricula, but a way of conceiving of the curriculum which is centred around key problems in professional practice. • Interactive learning • In experiential learning: "... the learner is directly in touch with the realities being studied ... [experiential learning] involves direct encounter with the phenomenon being studied rather than merely thinking about the encounter or only considering the possibility of doing something with it" (Kolb, 1984).

5. 2.The PIER approach • Experiential learning • Activity one should mainly be considered as a starting point for the other three activities in the PIER approach. Consequently, the PIER approach as a whole must be thought of as a start of an extensive organizational change and learning process. This is the main difference between PIER and most other similar simulations. • Role play • Role-playing helps students view situations from alternative perspectives.

6. 3.Framework and methodology for PIER

7. 3.Framework and methodology for PIER

8. 3.Framework and methodology for PIER

9. 3.Framework and methodology for PIER

10. 3.Framework and methodology for PIER

11. 4.The simulation with PIER • The students from South Africa(21) and Sweden(10) were chosen. • The experiment with the students in South Africa and Sweden consisted of two sessions coinciding with activities one and three of PIER. Individual students carried out the second and fourth activities.

12. 5.Results of the lecture questionnaire The student identified their likes or dislikes according to “did not like at all” (1) to “like very much” (7).

13. 6.Discussion • The use of the PIER framework is not confined solely to a typical education environment, but is applicable to learning for professionals in practice. • Another major advantage of PIER is that the natural ways of learning by practitioners are used: learning through experience (Kolb, 1984), through reflection (Schon 1983 and 1987) and by facing a problem (Schon, 1987). • All of these learning strategies are combined in PIER which takes advantage of their strengths.

14. 7.Conclusion • It was found that the combined use of an interactive multimedia (IMM) simulation and PIER methodology was effective for learning about information system project failure and escalation. • We claim that it is important that we try new ways of teaching, and that we should not continue to show our students only how to complete successful projects, but also how to gain experience from less successful projects.