Exploring How Individual Traits Influence Enjoyment in a Mobile Learning Game

This study investigated individual traits as predictors of game enjoyment by including learning style, intrinsic motivation, collaboration skills, and computer game attitude as key parts of a model that also included achievement. Results of correlation and regression analyses revealed that intrinsic motivation was the only variable to predict game enjoyment. This supports the conceptualization of enjoyment as need satisfaction of intrinsic needs. Enjoyment was also found to be positively correlated with achievement. Other significant relations emerged, particularly how a player’s attitude toward games predicted intrinsic motivation. The present study examined children’s enjoyment experiences in the mobile version of the Minecraft game. It also highlights the complexity of game enjoyment as it relates to mobile learning games

Mechanisms for collaboration: a design and evaluation framework for multi-user interfaces

Multi-user interfaces are said to provide “natural” interaction in supporting collaboration, compared to individual and noncolocated technologies. We identify three mechanisms accounting for the success of such interfaces: high awareness of others' actions and intentions, high control over the interface, and high availability of background information. We challenge the idea that interaction over such interfaces is necessarily “natural” and argue that everyday interaction involves constraints on awareness, control, and availability. These constraints help people interact more smoothly. We draw from social developmental psychology to characterize the design of multi-user interfaces in terms of how constraints on these mechanisms can be best used to promote collaboration. We use this framework of mechanisms and constraints to explain the successes and failures of existing designs, then apply it to three case studies of design, and finally derive from them a set of questions to consider when designing and analysing multi-user interfaces for collaboration

Collaborative Technology For Young Children's Outdoor Education

Children participating in classroom field trips learn first hand in an authentic context. However, activities during these trips are often limited to observation and data collection. Children synthesize their knowledge later, in classroom discussions and in the collaborative construction of a representational artifact. But the classroom is removed from the authentic context in which the knowledge was gained. My research investigated how mobile technology can bridge this gap by supporting and encouraging young children (grades K-4) to collaboratively construct knowledge artifacts, while simultaneously exploring open, educational environments. Three key elements are addressed; creating a concrete connection between digital information and the real world, supporting awareness of collaborative opportunities in an open environment, and promoting face-to-face collaboration. This dissertation details the conception, design, implementation, and evaluation of the Tangible Flags technology; a tangible interface that is developmentally appropriate for children (grades K-4) to embed and access digital information through their physical environment and multi-user tools that support collaboration in open environments. Tangible Flags are simple for children to attach to the environment and promote an awareness of artifact creation and exploration activities because they are visually apparent. An interface that provides an awareness of changes to digital artifacts and enables concurrent and remote access to these artifacts further enhances collaboration. Two studies were conducted to evaluate the concepts of Tangible Flags. A case study was conducted in an authentic outdoor learning environment, a National Park. A second study compares children's use of the Tangible Flags technology to a roughly equivalent paper system. Quantitative and qualitative analysis indicates that children using Tangible Flags participated in more asynchronous collaborative activity and were more engaged than those who did not. It also showed that awareness of peer activity combined with remote and concurrent access to digital artifacts resulted in increased face-to-face collaborative activity and examines the impact of artifact awareness and access on children's focus on the environment. These contributions will be useful to educators, designers of educational environments and researchers in the field of children's educational technology

Collective knowledge advancement as a pedagogical practice in teacher education. An explorative case study of student group work with wiki assignments in the interplay between an offline and a global online setting

ENGELSK: The aim of this dissertation was to describe and analyze collective knowledge advancement (CKA) as a pedagogical practice in teacher education. The background is that Internet permits new types of authentic knowledge production that make it possible for anyone to make contributions (e.g., Wikipedia). In the future, it is expected that schools and teacher education institutions will let students make contributions in these online settings to a greater degree. The present study explored how student groups worked with different wiki assignments in one specific teacher education course. A range of different types of data (group interviews, video data, screen capture data, and wiki log data) were collected. By utilizing two theoretical concepts (germ cell and contradictions) from cultural-historical activity theory, help was identified as the singular entity that exhibited the simplest possible characteristics of CKA as a pedagogical practice. On the basis of these findings, it was concluded that three different types of help are particularly important. These include help as informal peer feedback, which relies on spontaneous verbalization of ongoing thoughts, and help that is provided through the open publication of student work in the online setting. The third type of help requires that all students be assigned as helpers for each other so they can share the workload more equally. This dissertation contributes to educational research in five ways. First, the findings indicate that different types of informal teaching are important components of CKA as a pedagogical practice. Second, the results also describe new types of authentic learning that build on interactions between students and outsiders in the online setting. Third, the findings suggest that it is possible to turn campus-based teaching into a “practicum period” by letting students experiment with new types of collaboration. Fourth, the findings show that a polycontextual pedagogical practice emerges in the interplay between an offline setting and several different online settings. Finally, the analysis demonstrated that the notion of a germ cell provides a powerful means of studying different types of pedagogical practice. NORSK: Denne avhandlingen har som formål å beskrive og analysere kollektiv kunnskapsutvikling som en pedagogisk praksis i lærerutdanningen. Bakgrunnen er at internett nå muliggjør mange nye typer autentisk kunnskapsproduksjon der hvem som helst kan være med å bidra (for eksempel Wikipedia). Man vil kunne forvente at både lærerutdanning og skoler i større grad vil la elever være aktive bidragsytere i slike online-miljø. Denne forskningsstudien utforsker hvordan studenter samarbeider når de løser ulike wikioppgaver på et studium i lærerutdanningen. Flere ulike typer data har blitt samlet inn (gruppeintervju, videoopptak av studentsamarbeid, skjermaktivitet på datamaskin og wikilogg). Ved å ta i bruk to teoretiske begreper (kimcelle og kontradiksjoner) fra kulturhistorisk aktivitetsteori, så blir hjelp identifisert som den minste meningsfulle enheten som beskriver hva som karakteriserer kollektiv kunnskapsutvikling som en pedagogisk praksis. Studien viser at særlig tre spesifikke typer hjelp er viktig. Den første typen er hjelp som skjer i form av uformelle tilbakemeldinger mellom medstudenter. Her oppstår den spontant i verbale samtaler. Den andre typen er hjelp som blir gitt ved åpen publisering av studentarbeid i ulike online-miljø. Det tredje typen hjelp består i at alle studenter bør ha en rolle som hjelpere for hverandre i undervisningen slik at arbeidsbyrden blir fordelt mer rettferdig. Denne avhandlingen bidrar til utdanningsforskningen på fem ulike måter. For det første viser den at ulike typer uformell undervisning er sentrale i en pedagogisk praksis som bygger på kollektiv kunnskapsutvikling. For det andre beskriver funnene en ny type autentisk læring som bygger på kommunikasjon mellom studenter og utenforstående i et online-miljø. For det tredje viser funnene at lærerstudentene kan få en form for “praksistrening” på campus ved å eksperimentere med nye samarbeidsformer. For det fjerde viser funnene at den pedagogiske praksis kan analyseres som polykontekstuell fordi studentene deltar i både et lokalt offline-miljø og flere online-miljø. For det femte viser analysen at begrepet kimcelle kan brukes for å prøve å få en dypere forståelse for hva som kjennetegner ulike pedagogiske praksiser.publishedVersio