Multimodal K-12 Assessment Frameworks and the Interactive Audience: An Exploratory Analysis of Existing Frameworks

Multimodal writing often occurs through membership in an online, participatory culture; thus, the audience for student writers potentially can shift from imagined readers to actual, accessible readers and responders. In this article, we thoroughly review the idea of audience and then report results from an exploratory review of K-12 assessment frameworks and analyze how key frameworks address the need for consideration of an interactive audience. We found that multimodal composition is being defined consistently across all frameworks as composition that includes multiple ways of communicating, but the majority of multimodal composition examples were texts that were non-interactive composition types (as far as online and participatory interaction with the actual audience is concerned) even though many authors acknowledged the emergence of interactive online composition types that afford the writer the ability to communicate and collaborate with an audience

Museum Audio Description: Multimodal and 'Multisensory' Translation: A Case Study from the British Museum

This paper first illustrates the major revisions, such as a new view of society, the nation, and education, introduced by the New Museology or Museum Studies in the 1980s and 1990s. These changes certainly favoured the development of museum audio description. As museum audio description can be included in the new forms of interactivity, the change of paradigm of interactivity in new museums is analysed and examples are given. Then, a general overview of audio description and its process creation are briefly illustrated in their strengths and limitations. This overview anticipates the two complementary studies on museum audio description as multimodal and multisensory translation. Both studies see the museum and its audio description as an interactive multimodal communicative event but the former focusses more on the grammar of multimodality, whereas the latter emphasises aspects of artistic fruition and the importance of a creative and interpretative language. The paper concludes with my analysis of a museum audio description from the British Museum, focussing in particular on cohesion and coherence

Machine Understanding of Human Behavior

A widely accepted prediction is that computing will move to the background, weaving itself into the fabric of our everyday living spaces and projecting the human user into the foreground. If this prediction is to come true, then next generation computing, which we will call human computing, should be about anticipatory user interfaces that should be human-centered, built for humans based on human models. They should transcend the traditional keyboard and mouse to include natural, human-like interactive functions including understanding and emulating certain human behaviors such as affective and social signaling. This article discusses a number of components of human behavior, how they might be integrated into computers, and how far we are from realizing the front end of human computing, that is, how far are we from enabling computers to understand human behavior

Designing Embodied Interactive Software Agents for E-Learning: Principles, Components, and Roles

Embodied interactive software agents are complex autonomous, adaptive, and social software systems with a digital embodiment that enables them to act on and react to other entities (users, objects, and other agents) in their environment through bodily actions, which include the use of verbal and non-verbal communicative behaviors in face-to-face interactions with the user. These agents have been developed for various roles in different application domains, in which they perform tasks that have been assigned to them by their developers or delegated to them by their users or by other agents. In computer-assisted learning, embodied interactive pedagogical software agents have the general task to promote human learning by working with students (and other agents) in computer-based learning environments, among them e-learning platforms based on Internet technologies, such as the Virtual Linguistics Campus (www.linguistics-online.com). In these environments, pedagogical agents provide contextualized, qualified, personalized, and timely assistance, cooperation, instruction, motivation, and services for both individual learners and groups of learners. This thesis develops a comprehensive, multidisciplinary, and user-oriented view of the design of embodied interactive pedagogical software agents, which integrates theoretical and practical insights from various academic and other fields. The research intends to contribute to the scientific understanding of issues, methods, theories, and technologies that are involved in the design, implementation, and evaluation of embodied interactive software agents for different roles in e-learning and other areas. For developers, the thesis provides sixteen basic principles (Added Value, Perceptible Qualities, Balanced Design, Coherence, Consistency, Completeness, Comprehensibility, Individuality, Variability, Communicative Ability, Modularity, Teamwork, Participatory Design, Role Awareness, Cultural Awareness, and Relationship Building) plus a large number of specific guidelines for the design of embodied interactive software agents and their components. Furthermore, it offers critical reviews of theories, concepts, approaches, and technologies from different areas and disciplines that are relevant to agent design. Finally, it discusses three pedagogical agent roles (virtual native speaker, coach, and peer) in the scenario of the linguistic fieldwork classes on the Virtual Linguistics Campus and presents detailed considerations for the design of an agent for one of these roles (the virtual native speaker)

Data stories : rethinking journalistic storytelling in the context of data journalism

This paper addresses the increased use of data and data visualization in newsrooms, which has yielded a new form of storytelling: data stories. In journalism, data stories or storytelling with data are the new buzzwords. What journalists mean by data stories, however, remains blurred. We use the emergence of data stories as an opportunity to describe the changing understanding of journalistic storytelling. Based on interviews with editorial leaders, data journalists, developers, and designers in 26 major news organizations in Europe, we focus on practitioners’ perspective on data stories. In our empirical study, we identified seven key features of journalistic data stories: data, communicative function, the textual-visual relationship, structure and design of a story, interactivity, and the meta-story. These findings contribute to rethinking the narrative approach to journalism

Video games as a source of extramural English:Finnish university students’ perspective

Abstract. This thesis examines how video games as an entertaining pastime activity may function as a source of extramural English language learning for Finnish players. Previous research about video games and learning has been primarily focused on identifying learning principles deeply rooted in the design of video games. This study examines video games in their immediate sociocultural context, as a form of popular culture comprised of complex communities and activities. The study applied qualitative research methods. The data for this study comes from ten semi-structured interview sessions with Finnish university students of English who were active gamers during their early formal education and listed playing video games as a pastime activity. The interview required informants to give information about their experiences and opinions in relation to video games and English second language learning. The results of the thesis show that the informants consider video games as a significant, effective, and versatile source of additional language learning. Additionally, the results show that the learning experiences described by the informants often realize the characteristics of modern sociocultural learning theories and approaches.Tiivistelmä. Tässä opinnäytetyössä tutkitaan, miten englanninkielisten videopelien pelaaminen voi edistää suomenkielisten pelaajien kouluajan ulkopuolista oppimista. Aikaisempi tutkimus pelien ja oppimisen suhteesta on keskittynyt pitkälti pelien oppimiselle olennaisten toimintaperiaatteiden kartoittamiseen. Tässä tutkimuksessa tarkastellaan pelejä ja oppimista irrottamatta niitä sosiokulttuurisesta viitekehyksestään populaarikulttuurin muotona, joka koostuu monitahoisista yhteisöistä ja aktiviteeteistä. Tutkimusmenetelmä on laadullinen. Tutkimusaineisto koostuu teemahaastatteluista, jonka kymmenen haastateltavaa ovat äidinkielenään suomea puhuvia englannin kielen yliopisto-opiskelijoita. Kaikki haastateltavat harrastivat videopelejä peruskoulun aikana. Haastattelussa osallistujia pyydettiin kertomaan kokemuksistaan ja mielipiteistään englannin kielen oppimisesta videopelien kautta. Tutkimus osoittaa, että haastateltaville videopelit ovat olleet merkittävä, hyvin toimiva ja monipuolinen kanava englannin kielen oppimisessa. Lisäksi tutkimuksessa todetaan, että haastateltavien kuvauksien perusteella pelien kautta tapahtuva oppiminen myötäilee nykyaikaisten sosiokulttuuristen oppimiskäsitysten malleja

Paradoxes of interactivity: perspectives for media theory, human-computer interaction, and artistic investigations

Current findings from anthropology, genetics, prehistory, cognitive and neuroscience indicate that human nature is grounded in a co-evolution of tool use, symbolic communication, social interaction and cultural transmission. Digital information technology has recently entered as a new tool in this co-evolution, and will probably have the strongest impact on shaping the human mind in the near future. A common effort from the humanities, the sciences, art and technology is necessary to understand this ongoing co- evolutionary process. Interactivity is a key for understanding the new relationships formed by humans with social robots as well as interactive environments and wearables underlying this process. Of special importance for understanding interactivity are human-computer and human-robot interaction, as well as media theory and New Media Art. "Paradoxes of Interactivity" brings together reflections on "interactivity" from different theoretical perspectives, the interplay of science and art, and recent technological developments for artistic applications, especially in the realm of sound

Paradoxes of Interactivity

Current findings from anthropology, genetics, prehistory, cognitive and neuroscience indicate that human nature is grounded in a co-evolution of tool use, symbolic communication, social interaction and cultural transmission. Digital information technology has recently entered as a new tool in this co-evolution, and will probably have the strongest impact on shaping the human mind in the near future. A common effort from the humanities, the sciences, art and technology is necessary to understand this ongoing co- evolutionary process. Interactivity is a key for understanding the new relationships formed by humans with social robots as well as interactive environments and wearables underlying this process. Of special importance for understanding interactivity are human-computer and human-robot interaction, as well as media theory and New Media Art. »Paradoxes of Interactivity« brings together reflections on »interactivity« from different theoretical perspectives, the interplay of science and art, and recent technological developments for artistic applications, especially in the realm of sound

Digital Games and Second Language Learning among Tertiary-level EFL Learners: A Critical Review

Despite the increased interest in the possibilities of digital games in second language education, their use in higher education is a relatively uncharted territory. This review was carried out to examine how digital game-based language learning is used, and what its effects are on language learners at tertiary level in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) contexts. Twenty-seven studies were short-listed from academic literature and were analysed for research methodology, theoretical frameworks, research foci, game types and specifications, research results, and pedagogical implications. The research revealed six types of digital games, each with its own affordances that could enhance language learning. It was also found that these games increased vocabulary uptake and long-term lexical retention, enhanced L2 reading and listening comprehension, fostered writing ability and communicative competence, and increased motivation and willingness to communicate in the L2. Therefore, it may be deduced that digital games can be employed as a beneficial tool for the development of L2 competence and for the enrichment of the language learning experience. Suggestions for further research and educational implications have been provided