A review of the evidence on the use of ICT in the Early Years Foundation Stage

This report reviewed existing evidence on the potential of technology to support the development of educational policy and practice in the context of the Early Years Foundation Stage. Reference is made to the use of ICT by young children from aged birth to five years and its potential impacts, positive and negative on their cognitive, social, emotional educational, visual and physical development

Children\u27s choices: the technology choices that children make within their free time. Influences and implications

The Irish Neighbourhood Play Research Project included almost 1700 families and 240 communities throughout Ireland. Using parental surveys and naturalistic observation, data was secured on how children in modern Ireland aged 0-14 are spending their free time. An all-island approach was taken incorporating cities, towns and rural areas across a variety of socio-economic groupings. Interesting findings arose from the data relating to the choices that children are making within their free time. This paper focuses on the choices they are making within technology use. Data on the children’s technological engagement will be presented and discussed through a child development lens. The positive and negative implications for both learning and development are raised. This generation of children will be the first to emerge into adulthood without ever experiencing a world without technology. For them, it will always have been central to their existence. What does this mean for the next generation of humanity? ©IATED (2016). Permission granted by IATED for inclusion in ResearchOnline@N

Motivating children to learn effectively: exploring the value of intrinsic integration in educational games

The concept of intrinsic motivation lies at the heart of the user engagement created by digital games. Yet despite this, educational software has traditionally attempted to harness games as extrinsic motivation by using them as a sugar coating for learning content. This article tests the concept of intrinsic integration as a way of creating a more productive relationship between educational games and their learning content. Two studies assessed this approach by designing and evaluating an educational game called Zombie Division to teach mathematics to 7- to 11-year-olds. Study 1 examined the learning gains of 58 children who played either the intrinsic, extrinsic, or control variants of Zombie Division for 2 hr, supported by their classroom teacher. Study 2 compared time on task for the intrinsic and extrinsic variants of the game when 16 children had free choice of which game to play. The results showed that children learned more from the intrinsic version of the game under fixed time limits and spent 7 times longer playing it in free-time situations. Together, these studies offer evidence for the genuine value of an intrinsic approach for creating effective educational games. The theoretical and commercial implications of these findings are discussed

Effectiveness if traditional games compared with technological games in classroom climate and student's performance in the EFL classroom : a quasi-experimental research

Tesis (Pedagogía en Inglés)The present study intended to corroborate the hypothesis that both technological and traditional games can help school students in their learning process and that traditional games unlike technological ones, also help in the creation of a better classroom climate. Through a quasi-experiment in three different educational settings, control groups and experimental ones were going to be measured both in students’ performance expressed in marks and in classroom climate measured with a sociometric test. Chile’s current national contingency has prevented this study to be concluded as expected. As an alternative outcome, the researchers carried out a perception study that compared student’s acceptance of both technological and traditional games. The result of this study shows that current students, who are digital natives, showed a slight preference for traditional games over the technological ones, defying the common belief that students only react positively to technology.El presente estudio pretende corroborar la hipótesis de que tanto los juegos tecnológicos como los tradicionales pueden ayudar a los alumnos en su proceso de aprendizaje y que los juegos tradicionales a diferencia de los tecnológicos pueden ayudar, además en la creación de un mejor clima de aula. A través de un cuasi-experimento en tres diferentes establecimientos educacionales, en los grupo de control y experimentales se iba a medir tanto el rendimiento de los estudiantes expresado a través de sus calificaciones, como el clima de aula medido a través de un cuestionario sociométrico. La actual contingencia nacional de Chile ha impedido que este estudio concluya según lo previsto. Como alternativa, los investigadores llevaron a cabo un estudio de percepción que comparó la aceptación de los estudiantes hacia los juegos tecnológicos y tradicionales. El resultado de este estudio muestra que los estudiantes, siendo nativos digitales. mostraron una ligera preferencia por los juegos tradicionales por sobre los tecnológicos, desafiando la creencia general de que los estudiantes solo reaccionan positivamente ante la tecnología

Simulating naturalistic instruction: the case for a voice mediated interface for assistive technology for cognition

A variety of brain pathologies can result in difficulties performing complex behavioural sequences. Assistive technology for cognition (ATC) attempts support of complex sequences with the aim of reducing disability. Traditional ATCs are cognitively demanding to use and thus have had poor uptake. A more intuitive interface may allow ATCs to reach their potential. Insights from psychological science may be useful to technologists in this area. We propose that an auditory-verbal interface is more intuitive than a visual interface and reduces cognitive demands on users. Two experiments demonstrate a novel ATC, the General User Interface for Disorders of Execution (GUIDE). GUIDE is novel because it simulates normal conversational prompting to support task performance. GUIDE provides verbal prompts and questions and voice recognition allows the user to interact with the GUIDE. Research with non-cognitively impaired participants and a single participant experiment involving a person with vascular dementia provide support for using interactive auditory-verbal interfaces. Suggestions for the future development of auditory-verbal interfaces are discussed

Mobile learning: benefits of augmented reality in geometry teaching

As a consequence of the technological advances and the widespread use of mobile devices to access information and communication in the last decades, mobile learning has become a spontaneous learning model, providing a more flexible and collaborative technology-based learning. Thus, mobile technologies can create new opportunities for enhancing the pupils’ learning experiences. This paper presents the development of a game to assist teaching and learning, aiming to help students acquire knowledge in the field of geometry. The game was intended to develop the following competences in primary school learners (8-10 years): a better visualization of geometric objects on a plane and in space; understanding of the properties of geometric solids; and familiarization with the vocabulary of geometry. Findings show that by using the game, students have improved around 35% the hits of correct responses to the classification and differentiation between edge, vertex and face in 3D solids.This research was supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council Design Star CDT (AH/L503770/1), the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) projects LARSyS (UID/EEA/50009/2013) and CIAC-Research Centre for Arts and Communication.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio