Paradigms for the design of multimedia learning environments in engineering

The starting point for this research was the belief that interactive multimedia learning environments represent a significant evolution in computer based learning and therefore their design requires a re-examination of the underlying principles of learning and knowledge representation. Current multimedia learning environments (MLEs) can be seen as descendants of the earlier technologies of computer-aided learning (CAL), intelligent tutoring systems (ITS) and videodisc-based learning systems. As such they can benefit from much of the wisdom which emerged from those technologies. However, multimedia can be distinguished from earlier technologies by its much greater facility in bringing to the learner high levels of interaction with and control over still and moving image, animation, sound and graphics. Our intuition tells us that this facility has the potential to create learning environments which are not merely substitutes for "live" teaching, but which are capable of elucidating complex conceptual knowledge in ways which have not previously been possible. If the potential of interactive multimedia for learning is to be properly exploited then it needs to be better understood. MLEs should not just be regarded as a slicker version of CAL, ITS or videodisc but a new technology requiring a reinterpretation of the existing theories of learning and knowledge representation. The work described in this thesis aims to contribute to a better understanding of the ways in which MLEs can aid learning. A knowledge engineering approach was taken to the design of a MLE for civil engineers. This involved analysing in detail the knowledge content of the learning domain in terms of different paradigms of human learning and knowledge representation. From this basis, a design strategy was developed which matched the nature of the domain knowledge to the most appropriate delivery techniques. The Cognitive Apprenticeship Model (CAM) was shown to be able to support the integration and presentation of the different categories of knowledge in a coherent instructional framework. It is concluded that this approach is helpful in enabling designers of multimedia systems both to capture and to present a rich picture of the domain. The focus of the thesis is concentrated on the domain of Civil Engineering and the learning of concepts and design skills within that domain. However, much of it could be extended to other highly visual domains such as mechanical engineering. Many of the points can also be seen to be much more widely relevant to the design of any MLE.Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Counci

Supporting students' construction of hypermedia

This thesis considers the proposition that hypermedia may be employed effectively in higher education. More specifically, the question of its use by undergraduate music students to assist in writing essays and dissertations is investigated. The work begins with a review of general issues relating to educational hypermedia, such as its history, application, design and architecture. A user-centred approach to hypermedia development is advocated, and after critique and analysis of the literature, a framework for human-computer interaction for educational hypermedia is proposed. A case study is reported which serves to facilitate the undertaking of original research, as well as to evaluate the proposed framework. Other environments are also selected to carry out more generic research. Both reading strategies and writing strategies are investigated, and the results from these studies are used to conduct a repertory grid analysis of students' approaches to and perceptions of essay and dissertation development. The outcome of this experiment concludes with a proposal for a structural model of essay and dissertation development. Analysis of the model suggests the need for further survey analysis of taskartefact usage in specific educational domains, and experimental studies into electronic document manipulation and the reading of music from computer screens are investigated with respect to the case study environment. The implications of the research carried out in this thesis have assisted in and helped to justify the design of the prototype system HECTOR (Hypermedia, from Essay Conception TO Realisation). It aims to support students in their research, planning and writing of essays and dissertations. HECTOR has been evaluated in the field, and the results of this go some way to supporting the hypothesis of the thesis - that hypermedia can be employed effectively in higher education

"That's not how it should end!": the effect of reader/player response on the development of narrative

When the final instalment of the videogame series Mass Effect was released in March 2012, many fans used online forums to express displeasure at the game's ending. A surprising number suggested that Victorian writers such as Charles Dickens and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle were far more attentive and responsive to their audience's preferences than modern authors or videogame writers. This thesis, in part, seeks to explore the veracity of this idea through a creative-critical comparison of key examples of Victorian serial fiction and modern episodic videogames, and through the creation of an interactive novella. The creative-critical element of the thesis is produced in two formats which examine how serial texts may be considered 'interactive' due to the unique opportunity they provide for readers to influence the act of textual production; the extent to which videogames may be considered serial due to their structure, content, and modes of delivery; the controversies surrounding consumption of serials and videogames; and how techniques relating to characterisation, character death and endings operate within serial and interactive forms. Focussing primarily on Great Expectations, selected Sherlock Holmes stories, and the Mass Effect and Life is Strange videogame series, the role of writer and reader as collaborative participants in the creation of narrative content is examined in particular in relation to the tropes of the magic trick, the telepathic exchange and the detective duo. The creative component of the thesis puts some of these findings into practice by offering a story in which the reader-player gradually comes to realise the effect of their interventions in the narrative. Created using the authoring tool ChoiceScript, Writers Are Not Strangers plays with ideas of co-operation and control, and authorship and agency. Using a modular structure and quality-based salience (text dependent on previous user choices) this multi-branching, multiple-ended text attempts to craft a story in response to its reader, while never fully giving over control

Hypertextuality and polyphony in Tom Stoppard's stage plays

This thesis analyses selected works of Tom Stoppard in terms of Genette's notion of 'hypertextuality' as transtextual relationship and Bakhtin's 'polyphony' of voices and ideas, and examines how the playwright's (re)creative and (re)interpretive rendering of literature, philosophy, aesthetics, science, art, culture and history offers his contemporary perspective on the multiplicity of themes and texts in the plays. The thesis identifies the appeal in (re)reading or (re)spectating Stoppard's explicitly palimpsestuous texts, while considering the extent to which receivers of the hypertexts need to be aware of and conversant with the hypotexts in order to fully appreciate Stoppard's work. Following the opening chapter, in which the critical concepts of hypertextuality and polyphony are discussed, chapter 2 considers Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1967) as a transfocalization of Shakespeare's Hamlet, demonstrating polyphony of dualities. Chapter 3 looks at Travesties (1974) as a hypertext which employs plural hypertextualities (pastiche, mixed parody and travesty) and which exhibits polyphony of perceptions on art and politics, using the device of mise-en-abyme. Chapter 4 explores Arcadia (1993) in terms of dramatic transposition of ideas from other disciplines and reactivation ofliterary pastoral traditions. In chapter 5, Indian Ink (1995) is analysed as a post-colonial perspective on the ethics of empire, re-contextualizing works of Anglo-Indian literature and art. Chapter 6 discusses The Coast of Utopia trilogy (2002) in terms of intermodal transmodalization, along with duplicity and polyphony of textual, structural and ideological layers. The concluding chapter questions the effect of Stoppard's hypertextual adaptation and polyphonic re-presentations on audiences and readers of different levels of familiarity with the hypotexts, arguing that the carefully constructed combination of contrasting ideas, paradoxes and dualities in Stoppard's hypertexts offers opportunities for appreciation at various levels of 'knowing', exposing the subjectivity of perceptions and celebrating the many- voicedness of society.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Virginia Woolf and cinema : Adaptations of Mrs Dalloway.

This thesis proposes a return to the issue of fidelity criticism in adaptation studies through a detailed consideration of the adaptations of Virginia Woolfs Mrs Dalloway (1925). Within adaptation studies the issue of fidelity and the role of the source novel have been relegated to the sidelines in response to a logophilic prejudice which dominated early studies, and as a consequence intertextuality and genre have become more pronounced. I redress this negation of the source text, theorising new ways of conceiving of the source-adaptation relationship. I explicitly focus upon source-associated intertextualities to illustrate how a return to fidelity can open up a plethora of readings rather than close them down. In doing so the importance of the source text is foregrounded, as it is through the source that these intertexts are introduced, whilst demonstrating that two seemingly exclusive approaches to adaptation can be married in what I term a "web of intertextuality".I develop Gerard Genette's theory of stylistic imitation in order to theorise how an adaptation may develop a relationship with its source based on rhetoric, or style. I consider how Marleen Gorris'Mrs Dalloway (1997) adapts Woolfs literary impressionism through the use of the visual (editing and framing) as well as the aural, including the verbal (voice-over) and the non-verbal (the scored soundtrack). My analysis of The Hours, both Michael Cunningham's novel (1998) and Stephen Daldry's film (2002), examines how both texts develop a stylistic relationship with Woolfs novel through the presence of other Woolf intertexts such as her fiction (The Waves), her literary criticism ("Mr Bennett and Mrs Brown"), as well as her autobiographical writings. I address the diverse nature of intertextuality as I analyse alternative intertexts such as the cultural iconicity of Virginia Woolf and the figure of the hysteric. I consider how the merging of fiction, biography and cultural iconicity influences adaptation and its critical reception, promoting an on-going dialogue across the multiple texts present. The thesis found that a reclamation of the source novel and a return to fidelity produced a new means of conceiving of adaptation that incorporated both the source text and intertextuality which, through the web of intertextuality, presented an open, non-linear and potentially limitless way of reading adaptation

A multimodal framework for computer mediated learning : the reshaping of curriculum knowledge and learning

EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Translating Hamlet into Hungarian culture: a case study in rewriting and translocation

This thesis investigates the translation of Hamlet into Hungarian culture. In order to cover as wide a spectrum of translation as possible, the thesis employs Roman Jakobson's tripartite notion of translation: interlingual, intralingual and intersemiotic transfer. However, the thesis also challenges Jakobson's categories, especially with regard to the considerable degree of overlap that occurs.The first part of the thesis focuses on what is traditionally termed translation - translation 'proper' or interlingual translation. Nevertheless, in the context of the Hungarian Hamlets intralingual translation is also involved due to the central status of Janos Arany's 1867 translation. This translation influences the work of later translators, whether they approach the sacred text with the attitude of discipleship (that is to say, with reverence for Arany and with the intention of imitating or learning from Arany) or, less frequently, with the attitude of mastery (claiming equal or greater expertise). This process, which can be described as a Bloomian coming-to-terms with the father figure, is apparent when one looks at how famous Shakespearean-Aranyean fragments of Hamlet are 'retranslated' by subsequent translators. Apart from examples of the fragmentary afterlife of Arany's Hamlet, critical discourse also displays a certain taboo surrounding Arany's Hamlet.The second part of the thesis deals with interserniotic translation, providing a detailed case study of the 2003 Pécs performance based on a contemporary translation by Ádám Nádasdy. This instance of translation involves the transposition of a purely verbal text onto an art form that is not exclusively verbal.The third part of the thesis engages in the discussion of a spectrum of rewrites (or, in Jakobson's term, 'rewording') and follows a genre-based division: Hamletian ramifications in drama, fiction and poetry.The examination of these three interrelated areas of translation activity prompts the critic to envisage a complex Hungarian Hamlet palimpsest woven in the spirit of making Shakespeare and Hamlet 'our own'