Adaptive hypermedia driven serious game design and cognitive style in school settings: an exploratory study

The potential value of adaptive hypermedia and game based learning to education and training has long been recognised, numerous studies have been undertaken in both those areas investigating its potential to improve learner performance. In particular research has indicated that tailoring content to match the prior knowledge of the user has the power to increase the effectiveness of learning systems. Recent studies have begun to indicate that Adaptive Hypermedia Learning Systems (AHLS) based on cognitive styles have the power to improve learner performance. Recent examples of research exploring avenues for effectively incorporating serious games into AHLS indicated that integrating serious games into a personalized learning environment has the potential educational benefits of combining a personalized delivery with increased learner motivation. The exploratory study presented in this paper here developed an Adaptive Hypermedia Driven Serious Game (AHDSG) based around Pask’s Holist-Serialist dimension of cognitive style. A prototype AHDSG was designed and developed to teach students about Sutton Hoo and archaeological methods. Sixty-six secondary school students participated in this study. Overall the findings of this study show that there was an improvement in performance among all participants. Although the participants that used the system which adapted to their preferred cognitive style achieved a higher mean gain score, the difference was not significant

Towards Effective Combination of Prior Knowledge and Cognitive Styles in Adaptive Educational Hypermedia Systems

Adaptive Educational Hypermedia Learning Systems (AEHS) have been developed and evaluated over the past decade. These AEHS tailored navigational support and presentation of content basing on either prior knowledge or cognitive styles of students separately. The empirical evaluations of the AEHS showed that, generally, there is positive improvement in the performance and perceptions of students. There is, however, a need to explore how prior knowledge and cognitive styles could be strategically combined in AEHS in order to maximize learning and comprehension of educational materials. To this end, this paper pursues this exploration by presenting results of a comparative analysis between two AEHS, one tailored to student

Guideline for organizing content in adaptive learning system

In the past few years, various adaptive learning systems were developed in response to a widespread desire for all encompassing educational environments. However, these learning systems were developed by educational researchers using various techniques thereby resulting in varying outcomes. This is so because there is no specified guideline that leads to the development of an efficient and effective online adaptive learning system. Therefore, the need to propose guidelines for organizing content in an online adaptive learning system that will cater for all learners regardless of their differences. Several databases and keywords were used to ascertain the lack of guidelines in organizing content in adaptive learning systems. In this study, we propose a content adaptation guidelines for different type of learners in online adaptive learning systems based on Martinez learning style model as employing the same instructional conditions to all students can be pedagogically inefficient. The guideline is developed on the adaptation mapping from information in the student model which is carried out in four stages Organizing content, Individualized content, Adaptive navigation and Control level. These guidelines will help developers as well as educators with basic steps in developing a seamless online adaptive learning system for different type of learners