Machinima And Video-based Soft Skills Training

Multimedia training methods have traditionally relied heavily on video based technologies and significant research has shown these to be very effective training tools. However production of video is time and resource intensive. Machinima (pronounced \u27muh-sheen-eh-mah\u27) technologies are based on video gaming technology. Machinima technology allows video game technology to be manipulated into unique scenarios based on entertainment or training and practice applications. Machinima is the converting of these unique scenarios into video vignettes that tell a story. These vignettes can be interconnected with branching points in much the same way that education videos are interconnected as vignettes between decision points. This study addressed the effectiveness of machinima based soft-skills education using avatar actors versus the traditional video teaching application using human actors. This research also investigated the difference between presence reactions when using avatar actor produced video vignettes as compared to human actor produced video vignettes. Results indicated that the difference in training and/or practice effectiveness is statistically insignificant for presence, interactivity, quality and the skill of assertiveness. The skill of active listening presented a mixed result indicating the need for careful attention to detail in situations where body language and facial expressions are critical to communication. This study demonstrates that a significant opportunity exists for the exploitation of avatar actors in video based instruction

Actor & Avatar: A Scientific and Artistic Catalog

What kind of relationship do we have with artificial beings (avatars, puppets, robots, etc.)? What does it mean to mirror ourselves in them, to perform them or to play trial identity games with them? Actor & Avatar addresses these questions from artistic and scholarly angles. Contributions on the making of "technical others" and philosophical reflections on artificial alterity are flanked by neuroscientific studies on different ways of perceiving living persons and artificial counterparts. The contributors have achieved a successful artistic-scientific collaboration with extensive visual material

MANAGING A MIXED SKILL CLASS

In a digital environment students need to manage different types of skills - cognitive, emotive and manual. When working in a mixed-skill class the differences between student abilities can disrupt the rhythm and style of the learning process and demand flexibility in the teaching approach that is adopted

Go With The Flow: Examining The Effects Of Engagement Using Flow Theory And It\u27s Relationship To Achievement And Performance

Virtual Worlds have become an attractive platform for work, play, and learning. Businesses, including the public sector and academia, are increasingly investing their time, money, and attention to understanding the value of virtual worlds as a productivity tool. For example, educators are leading the way with research in Second Life, one of the more popular virtual worlds, as a potentially powerful medium for creating and delivering instruction. Still, little is empirically known about the value of virtual worlds as viable learning platforms. This study examined the instructional potential of Second Life for creating engaging activities, and to investigate the relationship between Second Life and learning in educational settings. It was hypothesized that a positive relationship exists between a learner\u27s level of engagement and achievement. Achievement was assessed as a learner\u27s level of recognition and recall of factual content. It was also hypothesized that a positive relationship exists between a learner\u27s level of engagement and their performance. Performance was assessed as a learner\u27s level of participation, initiative and effort. Additionally, exploratory research was conducted to examine the factors that contributed to both performance and engagement. Lastly, the relationship between other demographic factors of age, Second Life skill level, and ethnicity, with engagement was explored. This research used an empirically tested unit of web-based instructional framework known as a WebQuest. A 3D version, named VWQuest, was created in Second Life. One hundred volunteers completed participation. Using role play, participants participated in a quest for information. While exploring, participants were asked to take photos as evidence of their experiences. Upon completion, they took a knowledge check multiple-choice quiz, and a survey which measured their perceived level of engagement during the activity. Regression analysis indicated no positive correlation between a participant\u27s level of engagement and his or her achievement. However, a positive correlation was found between participants\u27 level of engagement and their performance. Second Life skill level was significantly correlated to performance, and engagement was found to be a mediator between skill level and performance. Most significantly and unexpectedly, participants\u27 performance varied so greatly, the performance rubric was revised four times before it comprehensively captured the diverse range of performances. This evidence suggests that open-ended and creative opportunities to perform yield levels of creativity, engagement, and innovation within immersive platforms, unexpected and far beyond that of traditional instructional settings. Investigating flow dimensions, engagement elements of user control and loss of time were found to be the most significant contributors to performance, and accounted for the greatest amount of variance in explaining performance. Confirmatory factor analysis showed that the flow factors of defined goals and feedback loaded the highest, suggesting a strong relationship between the two factors. Demographic analysis revealed no significant mean difference between gender and engagement, or between age and engagement. The majority of participants were between 40 and 50 and was instructors or educators, not students. For those interested in understanding appropriate and effective instruction in complex, immersive environments, this study brings together new important implications for all of them. Instructional designers may benefit from these findings in their creation of instructional content; instructors may benefit in their curriculum design and teaching methods; and researchers may understand specific facets with instructional potential--engagement factors, technologies, and instructional frameworks--worthy of further investigation

Using 3D Immersive Technologies for Organizational Development and Collaboration

Over the course of the Spring 2011 semester, a team of three student researchers, led by Dr. Ana Reyes of the University of Pennsylvania set out to explore the 3D immersive technologies currently in use by corporations, non-profit, government and academic organizations for organizational development and collaboration. During this first phase of the project, our team endeavored to identify organizations who are leading the way in the use of these technologies. Our hope was to tour the identified immersive workspaces, observe individuals or groups as they use these spaces and to interview key stakeholders such as the participants, the immersive project champions and organizational leaders and the vendors providing the solutions in order to identify best practices and key learnings from these early adopters. Our key objectives were as follows: Identify corporate, academic, non-profit and government workplaces that are presently utilizing 3D immersive environments to meet organization development needs; Understand why immersive technologies were chosen and how these organizations are using the 3D environments to accomplish their goals, and Derive lessons and insights from this research for the purposes of designing 3D Learning Conferences and a potential 3D Organizational Dynamics Laboratory at Penn. This paper provides a high-level business and technology summary of each platform reviewed, along with team observations about their capabilities and the challenges that we faced in our own use of each one. Later, it describes in varying detail several organizational use cases provided by vendors and key stakeholders, the benefits they realized from using 3D tools and the key learnings they acquired through their use of the immersive workspaces for organizational development and collaboration purposes. The conclusion highlights several best practices gathered from our research with both user organizations and technology vendors and proposes additional areas for further exploration

Learning archetypes as tools of Cybergogy for a 3D educational landscape: a structure for eTeaching in Second Life

This paper considers issues of validity and credibility of eTeaching using a 3D Virtual World as a delivery medium of eLearning pertaining to the transfer of authentic real life skills. It identifies the game like qualities perceived therein, recognising that these very attributes may, when experienced superficially, be a contributing factor to the potential educational demise of the platform. It goes on to examine traditional educational theories in the light of the affordances of a virtual world seeking to adapt and apply them to the construction of a new conceptual framework of a pedagogy reflecting the affordances and understanding of on-line learning which incorporates the implementation of Learning Archetypes (models of activities) to maximise the essence of a virtual world, in as much as it is able to facilitate learning experiences delimited by physical world constraints. It builds upon these ideas to develop a working model of Cybergogy and Learning Archetypes in 3D with a view to making it available to people who wish to demonstrate theoretically robust lesson and course planning. The model is then applied to three examples of eTeaching, developed as Case Studies for the purpose of critically evaluating the model, which is found to be operationally effective, accurate and flexible. Conclusions are drawn that identify the merits and challenges of implementing such a model of Cybergogy into eTeaching and eLearning conducted in Second Life®