Design Principles of the ESCOT Math Environments

1. Design Principles of the ESCOT Math Environments J. Underwood, ETS; C. Hoadley, Penn State U.; C. DiGiano, SRI Ctr for Technology in Learning; H. Stohl, , NCSU ; K. Hollebrands, NCSU The Process Example Design Principles • Review 25 applets, mark what is valued and what is not valued. • Discuss the most and least popular applets and problems. • Generate design principles. • Identify the intended behavior students are expected to display for each principle. • Characterize each applet by the design principles. • Assessthe extent to which students actually displayed the intended behavior. Enable early rewards. Supply history of actions. Provide dynamic linked representations. Followed: Balloon changes size on demand. Evidence: Students were happy when the balloon popped. Followed: List of all fractions attempted in each booth. Evidence: Students don’t duplicate effort, except to see the balloon pop again. Followed: Balloon size changes according to fraction entered. Evidence: Students were happy when the balloon enlarged for the improper fraction booth. The Principles Followed: Ratios show intermediate states. Evidence: Students showed satisfaction when they maintain the correct ratios. Violated:No history of actions is supplied. Evidence: Students sometimes duplicated strategies. Followed: Ratios and numbers are updated when fish are moved from pond to pond. Evidence: Students used the alternate rep’ns to check work; and talked about the different rep’ns. • Motivation • Familiar problem context • Use second person voice • Enable early reward for students (e.g. provide easy questions or activities they can do successfully) • For videogame-like activities, interactivity, high-quality graphics, etc. should match user expectations for playability • Presentation • Question, cover story and/or introduction should be clear, unwordy, unsuperfluous • Proofread text, labels, etc, with target users and age range in mind • All other things being equal, use professional conventions for content domain • Make links between representations obvious and ungratuitous • Use high-quality graphics and other media (e.g., still graphics, audio, animation) • Draw attention only to things that support the problem solving • Make everything described in the question obvious in the applet; align interactive and noninteractive parts • Support for problem-solving • Supply history of actions • Everything in there (questions, interface elements, activities) should have a sound pedagogical reason • Allow multiple entry points (e.g., ability, experiences, preferences, styles...) • The E-POW supports multiple approaches and multiple solution strategies (e.g., questions and/or applet) • Use dynamic multiple representations appropriately (linked/notlinked, multiple or single sources of control) • Give students opportunities to make predictions, commit to them, and examine outcomes • Thoughtful strategic use of the tool should be rewarded more than random use • Make a pedagogical decision about whether closure is needed. • Applet should give appropriate status feedback (say the right thing at the right time in the right way) • Programming of the applet supports the level of accuracy necessary for problem solving • Make effort involved in an activity proportional to the importance of what is needed to solve a problem • Technology should add value Followed: Student gets food, represented as a list, just like a vending machine gives “prizes” when the right amount of money is deposited. Expected evidence: Student feels a sense of doing something correct early on. Followed: Listing of coin combinations and change is recorded. Expected evidence: Student won’t duplicate coin deposits.