Catálogo de publicaciones - libros

This paper discusses a four-phase model for evaluating multi-media learning materials that emphasizes the diversity of learners and variations in instructional needs and user characteristics. The authors begin with an overview of the model, supporting evidence for its use, and key characteristics of users supported by each of the phases. They then focus on results of a current use that emphasized stage four, real-time usability, and show how they were able to document that the models under review met the needs of diverse learners and varied instructional strategies.

Augmented Reality (AR) applications are becoming increasingly available for everyday applications. In this paper, we concentrate on how to design and develop applications for educational purposes with the use of the ARToolkit and present an example from the area of human medicine. Since good Usability is essential, especially for non-expert end users, including both children and the elderly, we put particular emphasis on how to ensure good Usability. For both groups of end users, this technology has high potential and can be of great benefit. Within a small scale usability study amongst children, we could gain first experiences in their interaction with such applications. An essential factor is the notion of play, which could be beneficial to transport difficult learning material. On the basis of the gained insight, we provide an outlook for further work and we conclude that elderly could also benefit from this technology.

There is still very little research about students’ attitudes about e-learning. Such information seems to be necessary for a successful implementation of e-learning. Current research indicates that main advantages of e-learning are its flexibility and the provision of online learning material. A major drawback, as perceived by the students, is the lack of personal relationships. We conducted two focus groups to clarify these issues (N=54). The study supported the results from the literature. In addition, we found a few controversial issues as, e.g., preference for lectures/textbooks and tight schedules vs. preference for online learning and few deadlines. Another controversial issue was electronic assessment.

M-learning takes advantage of the use of mobile technologies (i.e. mobile phones, personal digital assistants, handheld computers) and allows students to carry out activities in a variety of settings and according to different paces. The paper discusses the main changes and challenges brought about by the use of m-technologies in school contexts with a special attention on one hand to the limitations posed, and on the other to the possibilities for enhancing students’ inclusion.

Use of the web-enabled software iWRITE in courses across the disciplines at several Canadian universities demonstrates that implementing instructional technology can lead faculty members to reconsider and reformulate their teaching methods. iWRITE operates in course-specific sites. It supports the integration of writing into disciplinary courses by displaying examples of past student work alongside grading criteria and instructor comments. Instructors unfamiliar with learning theory that validates the use of models may initially fear student copying or distrust the adequacy of student samples as guides, but many have rethought their assignments and strengthened other methods of instruction to take advantage of this method. In co-taught courses, selecting benchmark papers and formulating grading criteria requires examination of disciplinary values and frank discussion of standards. The effort of writing clear comments on the student samples also requires explicit formulation of disciplinary assumptions about the nature of knowledge and the relationship between writing and thinking.

First year students coming into university are often puzzled by the expectations of university discourse. For students in the Academic Bridging Program (ABP) directed at mature and under-prepared students this is especially manifest; these same questions are often expressed by students in traditional first year university classes. This challenge has been assisted by the use of a web-enabled software program, iWRITE which displays examples of past student work of essay assignments along with detailed comments by course instructors. The subsequent success of students in acquiring not only structures and vocabulary to help them navigate this new world of academic discourse but also a heightened sense of self-efficacy supports the concept of observational learning by the technology-mediated provision of models.

This exploratory study investigates, from the perspectives of learners and teachers, how e-learning is implemented in the domain of English for Academic Purposes (EAP), particularly in the teaching of reading and writing skills in universities and colleges in Israel. The study adapts Ben Shneiderman’s [1] view that learner-centered measures should be used to evaluate educational progress. The study was conducted in a natural setting, using a grounded approach and qualitative interpretation of data. Teachers who used e-learning responded to open-ended questions about their practices. Their students responded to open-ended questions which explored their perceptions of learning outcomes in academic language courses. To elicit in-depth reflection, volunteer students and teachers were interviewed. The findings may lay the groundwork for future studies exploring how e-learning affects students’ learning strategies, teacher/student relationships, the very nature of the classroom, to name but a few theoretical and pedagogical issues encountered.

Children tend to learn language conventions through processing environment stimuli. Thus, strategies for reading comprehension are commonly used for this purpose. This paper introduces AudioStoryTeller, a tool for pocketPC to support the development of reading and writing skills in learners with visual disabilities (LWVD) through storytelling, providing diverse evaluation tools to measure those skills. We implemented usability and cognitive evaluation to the AudioStoryTeller software. In the usability evaluation, the easiness of use of the proposed hardware by LWVD was established. The goal of the cognitive evaluation was to measure the development of reading skills through interactive audio narrations using a pocketPC device. Results indicate that users were able to utilize effortless the pocketPC device. AudioStoryTeller software together with cognitive tasks, can contribute to the development of cognitive skills in LWVD. This application allows LVD to have access to unlimited scope of books not available in printed Braille.

In the paper we present the first evaluation results obtained in the framework of ALPE (Accessible Learning Platform for Europe – EC-029328) a market validation project partially funded by the European Commission through the European Community Programme “eTEN”. During the first three months of the project, ALPE service is being customised to the needs of end-users in Spain, the U.K. and Greece. In addition, a small scale test of the service has already been performed by a group of visually and hearing impaired and adult learners coordinated by SIDAR Foundation. In this paper we describe i) ALPE service, including the platform and the courses offered, ii) the validation process and iii) the results from the initial end-user evaluation.

In this paper, an interface of a Mini-Go-game (Go game with a 9x9 board) on a network for the blind is studied. If the Mini-Go-game on the Internet for the blind can be realized as a web application using PC or a cellular phone, it is easy to obtain an opponent without going out. Therefore, we introduce a pen input guide which correspond to a 9x9 board, and propose a co-operative system of a Mini-Go-game with sound feedback.