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Alan White Donald Schwert North Dakota State University. Virtual Environments and Educational Role-Playing Games for Teaching Science. NDSU WWWIC World Wide Web Instructional Committee Paul Juell Donald Schwert
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Alan White Donald Schwert North Dakota State University Virtual Environments and Educational Role-Playing Games for Teaching Science
NDSU WWWIC World Wide Web Instructional Committee Paul Juell Donald Schwert Phillip McClean Brian Slator Bernhardt Saini-Eidukat Alan White WWWIC faculty supported by large teams of undergraduate and graduate students. WWWIC’s Virtual Worlds research supported by NSF grants DUE 97-52548 and EAR-9809761.
Teaching with Games • Educational software should be: engaging authentic entertaining supportive attractive constructive flexible • Games are extremely powerful if they are: engaging interactive entertaining attractive flexible • But, games often fail to teach . . . . . (anything useful)
Capitalizing on Human Nature People will play if you let them but Students will tire of rigid tutorials. People will play roles if you ask them but Students will quit if the experience is not sufficiently authentic.
Capitalizing on Human Nature People like to play (and play roles) ifSimulations are sufficiently authentic but not: Tediously detailed or Too predictable
Capitalizing on Human Nature Simulated environments should: Promote the right mind-set by making it easy to become involved
Educational Role-playing Games“Learning-by-doing” Experiences • MultiUser • Exploration • Spatially-oriented virtual worlds • Practical planning and decision making
Educational Role-playing Games“Learning-by-doing” Experiences • Problem solving • Scientific method • Real-world content • Mature thinking
Advantages of Virtual Worlds • Collapse virtual time and distance • Allow physical or practical impossibilities • Participate from anywhere • Interact with other users, virtual artifacts, and software agents • Multi-user collaborations and competitive play
WWWIC ProjectsContent from Anthropology to Zoology • Geology Explorer • Virtual Cell • Visual Program • ProgrammingLand • Dollar Bay Retailing Game
WWWIC ProjectsContent from Anthropology to Zoology • Blackwood Village • Virtual Polynesia • Crystal Growth • Tree Identification • Development Tools • Tutoring Agents • Assessment Tools
Technical Approaches • Networked, internet-based, client-server • MultiPlayer • Simulation-based • Implemented in Java applets
Technical Approaches • MUD = Multi User Domain • MOO = Object Oriented MUD Multi-user database for implementing objects and methods to represent rooms, containers and agents
Technical Approaches • MUDs and MOOs are typically task-oriented with keyboard interactions • Ours are also graphically-oriented, point & click interfaces
The Virtual World of Planet Oit • Planet Oit: Recently discovered. • Similar to Earth. • Same orbit. • Directly opposite the Sun.
The Geology Explorer: Planet OitGame Scenario • You are a geologist. • Explore this new planet. • Authentic geologic goals. - Locate and report valuable minerals. • Must learn geoscience content.
The Geology Explorer • 50 Places • 90 Different Rocks and Minerals • 15 Field Instruments • 25 Laboratory Instruments • Software Tutors
Date: Thu, 26 Mar 1998 10:18:38 -0500 From: tibbets <tibbets@texasonline.net> To: slator@badlands.nodak.edu Subject: Please send quick ans. Hello, You are very busy, no doubt, but would you please take a second to send an explanation (via email) to my son’s first grade teacher that the story of Planet Oit was a fictional story for a geology teaching project? She thinks that NASA has indeed found this planet that is like Earth, and is telling her students such. Just send it via my email and I’ll print it. Thank you, M. Tibbets Plainview, TX
FUTURE PLANS • Add process measurement and data interpretation. • Allow subsurface exploration. • “Redesign” planet: sophisticated geologic map + tectonic setting.
The Cell Rendered in VRML (Virtual Reality Modeling Language)
The Cell Users are assigned goals For example: Identify 6 different organelles
Experimentation Take samples from the cell back to the laboratory Use instruments, inhibitors, and mutations
Tutors are NeededIn Virtual Environments: • Students can join from any remote location • They can log in at any time of day or night • Human tutors cannot be available at all times to help • Students can foul things up and not know why
Tutors are NeededIn Virtual Environments: • Information is readily available • The simulation can track actions • The simulation can generate warnings and explanations • Tutor “visits” are triggered by user action
Tutors are NeededIn Virtual Environments: • Student interact with the intelligent tutoring agent • Students can ignore advise and carry on at their own risk
Intelligent Tutoring • Student actions are tracked • Students make errors and are tutored • Timely and appropriate remediation
Software Tutoring Agents • Deductive Tutoring: Provides assistance with deductive reasoning needed to solve a scientific problem • Case-based Tutoring: Presents examples of relevant experience (case studies) • Rule-based Tutoring: Provides assistance when student actions break encoded rules for the domain
Assessment • Not “multiple choice” recall • Content specific: Geology Cell Biology • Problem solving, hypothesis formation, deductive reasoning
Assessment by Scenarios • Assess computer literacy • PreTest: Present scenario, students propose course of action or solution • Engage in learning experience Control vs Virtual • PostTest: Present similar scenario, student response • Analysis of assessment data
The Geology Explorer: Assessment Protocol, Fall, 1998 Pre-course Assessment: 400+ students Computer Literacy Assessment: (244 volunteers) Divide by Computer Literacy and Geology Lab Experience Non-Participant Control Group: (150 students, approx.) Geology Explorer Treatment Group: (122 students) Geomagnetic (Alternative) Group: (122 students) Completed (78 students) Non-completed (44 students) Completed (95 students) Non-completed (27 students) Post-course Assessment: 368 students
To visit the Virtual Cell: www.ndsu.nodak.edu/wwwic Select: Projects Virtual Cell VRML Images 8. Latest Version To view VRML files, you will need a Web Browser Plug-in: CosmoPlayer