Eliciting Behavior From Interactive Narratives: Isolating the Role of Agency in Connecting With and Modeling Characters

A key component differentiating interactive storytelling from non-interactive media is agency, or control over character choices. A series of experiments show that providing agency over a character increased the user-character connection, which then increased engagement in a character-consistent charitable act. Findings were observed in technologically simple online narratives that controlled for navigation/controller differences, graphics, sounds, lengthy play, and avatar customization. Effects emerged even though users did not practice these acts by making their character behave charitably. Findings were robust across happy and unfortunate endings and across first-, second-, and third-person narrative perspectives. Findings suggest promise for developing inexpensive ‘‘storygames’’ to encourage supportive behaviors

From classroom tutor to hypertext adviser: An evaluation

This paper describes a three‐year experiment to investigate the possibility of making economies by replacing practical laboratory sessions with courseware while attempting to ensure that the quality of the student learning experience did not suffer. Pathology labs are a central component of the first‐year medical undergraduate curriculum at Southampton. Activities in these labs had been carefully designed and they were supervised by lab demonstrators who were subject domain experts. The labs were successful in the eyes of both staff and students but were expensive to conduct, in terms of equipment and staffing. Year by year evaluation of the introduction of courseware revealed that there was no measurable difference in student performance as a result of introducing the courseware, but that students were unhappy about the loss of interaction with the demonstrators. The final outcome of this experiment was a courseware replacement for six labs which included a software online hypertext adviser. The contribution of this work is that it adds to the body of empirical evidence in support of the importance of maintaining dialogue with students when introducing courseware, and it presents an example of how this interaction might be achieved in software

Does increasing communication through visual learning environments enhance student perceptions of lecturers?

The current study was conducted in an effort to examine whether increased levels of communication using visual learning environments (VLEs) alters student perceptions of lecturers. Eighty-six MSc students in Computing Science participated by using She and Fisher’s (2002) Teacher Communication Behavior Questionnaire (TCBQ). In addition to using the questionnaire, data from the electronic class site were used to make assessments about the quality and quantity of communication. Two types of classrooms were evaluated: a) a control condition in which the lecturer did not alter any communication aspect of the module, and b) the experimental condition in which the lecturer posted weekly discussion topics. Significant differences were found by cultural background and gender of the students. The bulletin board postings in the experimental condition were more heavily content-based than the control condition ones. The consistency in discussion topic of the experimental condition postings, both bulletin board and email, were more fluid than in the control condition

Incorporating Online Instruction in Academic Libraries: Getting Ahead of the Curve

A sea change in higher education is shaping the way many libraries deliver instruction to their students and faculty. Years of technological innovation and changes in the way that people discover and use information has made online instruction an essential part of a library\u27s teaching and learning program. In order to evaluate our library\u27s online instruction program and to determine its future goals, we analyzed the technology, pedagogical models, organizational structures, administrative supports, and partnerships we would need in order to succeed. Our findings may be useful for libraries reassessing their own online instruction programs

Case Studies on Institutional Open Approaches: The Open University

Interpreting openness has been part of The Open University’s mission since its foundation in 1969. As a distance teaching university it has always developed extensive educational resources for its students and occasionally for a wider audience but the emergence of open educational resources (OER) has challenged the ways in which it both develops and uses such teaching materials, in particular an over-reliance on in-house authoring and embedded third party materials and income from sales and licensing of such content. As educational resources are integral to the university’s teaching and business model a large scale, institution-wide, action research project aligned to University strategic objectives was established to examine the potential impact of OER in those models (with funding support from a US Foundation). Extensive research and evaluation activities plus widespread staff acceptance and experience in the use of OER in various parts of their work has enabled a gradual bottom-up adoption and planned top-down embedding of OER and other aspects of openness into most facets of University work after five years, including a defined open media policy

Learning dispositif and emotional attachment:a preliminary international investigation

This research investigated the significance of learning dispositif (LD) and emotional attachment (EA) on perceived learning success (LS) across a diaspora of Western, Russian, Asian, Middle Eastern and Chinese student cohorts. Foucault’s LD captures the disparate socio-cultural contexts, institutional milieus and more or less didactic teaching styles that moderate learning. EA is a multi-dimensional notion involving affective bonds that emerged in child psychology and spread to marketing and other fields. The sequential explanatory research reviewed the learning and EA literatures and generated an LD–EA framework to structure the quantitative phase of its mixed investigations. In 2017 and 2018, the research collected 150 responses and used a range of statistical techniques for quantitative analysis. It found that LS varied significantly across cohorts, intimating that dispositifs influence learning. Nonparametric analysis suggested that EA also influenced learning, but regressions were inconclusive. Exploratory techniques hint at a dynamic mix of emotional or cognitive motivations during the student learning journey, involving structural breaks in student/instructor relationships. Cluster analysis identified distinct student groupings, linked to years of learning. Separately, qualitative analysis of open-ended survey questions and expert interviews intimates that frequent teacher interactions can increase EA. The synthesis of quantitative with qualitative results and pedagogical reflection suggests that LD and EA both influence learning in a complex, dynamic system. The key constituents for EA are Affection, Connection, Social Presence (SP), Teaching Presence (TP) and Flow but student emotional engagement is conditioned by the socio-cultural milieu (LD) and associated factors like relationships and trust. Unlike in the Community of Learning framework, in the EA framework Cognitive Presence (CP) is an outcome of the interaction between these EA constituents, associated factors and the socio-cultural milieu. Finally, whilst awareness of culture and emotions is a useful pedagogical consideration, learning mainstays remain inclusive educational systems that identify student needs and support well-designed programmes. Within these, scaffolded modules should include a variety of engaging learning activities with non-threatening formative and trustworthy summative feedback. We acknowledge some statistical study limitations, but its tentative findings make a useful preliminary contribution

Does increasing communication through virtual learning environments enhance student perceptions of lecturers?

The current study was conducted in an effort to examine whether increased levels of communication using visual learning environments (VLEs) alters student perceptions of lecturers. Eighty-six MSc students in Computing Science participated by using She and Fisher’s (2002) Teacher Communication Behavior Questionnaire (TCBQ). In addition to using the questionnaire, data from the electronic class site were used to make assessments about the quality and quantity of communication. Two types of classrooms were evaluated: a) a control condition in which the lecturer did not alter any communication aspect of the module, and b) the experimental condition in which the lecturer posted weekly discussion topics. Significant differences were found by cultural background and gender of the students. The bulletin board postings in the experimental condition were more heavily content-based than the control condition ones. The consistency in discussion topic of the experimental condition postings, both bulletin board and email, were more fluid than in the control condition

Comparing automatically detected reflective texts with human judgements

This paper reports on the descriptive results of an experiment comparing automatically detected reflective and not-reflective texts against human judgements. Based on the theory of reflective writing assessment and their operationalisation five elements of reflection were defined. For each element of reflection a set of indicators was developed, which automatically annotate texts regarding reflection based on the parameterisation with authoritative texts. Using a large blog corpus 149 texts were retrieved, which were either annotated as reflective or notreflective. An online survey was then used to gather human judgements for these texts. These two data sets were used to compare the quality of the reflection detection algorithm with human judgments. The analysis indicates the expected difference between reflective and not reflective texts

The impact of professional learning on the teaching identities of higher education lecturers

Higher Education is currently undergoing some of the most profound changes in its history. Against a backdrop of increasing marketization, rising levels of student debt and far greater fully online offerings, the higher education lecturer is grappling with new ways of working and high expectations of teaching quality. This 3 year qualitative study based in The Open University UK investigates the ways in which HE distance learning lecturers are approaching professional development and learning, identifying what type of learning may be most effective in creating and sustaining an online teaching identity. The study also examines ways in which resistance discourse is shaping these identities and practices revealing emerging re- conceptualisations of what it means to be an effective and well-motivated distance learning lecturer. The investigation uses a framework for identity analysis which analyses professional identity via the expression of hegemonies, phenomenological, narrative articulations of identity, and a post-modern, constructivist view of identity which is shaped by social interactions and communities of practice. It highlights the importance of personal agency in identity formation. The results revealed a number of insights into the ways in which a combination of resistance discourse, professional learning and reflections from student interactions are shaping new understandings of professional knowledge in this context