Augmented Reality to Promote Guided Discovery Learning for STEM Learning

Augmented reality is one of the technologies that will impact teaching and learning. When augmented reality is applied in an educational setting, it can provide a superior learning environment because educators can add specific virtual information to enrich the existing learning materials or to create new learning materials that integrate the environment. Therefore, discussions on augmented reality applications for learning can be vastly found in the literature. Each application utilizes the resources available by using approaches appropriate for the learning outcome in question. The key problem with achieving learning outcome in analysing group one elements in a periodic table, is that some students have difficulties in visualizing an atom and what more to relate them with reactivity. The objective of this paper is to design and develop a learning application that supports science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education based on guided discovery learning to assist the students through questions based on exposure to various evidences via augmented reality. This application incorporates the use of 3D model of atoms and video of real experiments. To achieve the objective, action research is used to solve existing problem in a selected school. The application was evaluated by 25 students aged 16 years in a secondary school in Malaysia and has proven to be effective in  improving the students’ marks in tests conducted at the end of the application usage. The students can get many benefits from using the augmented reality based application because it supports Education 4.0 like flexibility in teaching and learning where learning is freed for the limitation of time, place and pace of study

Framework based on Mobile Augmented Reality for Translating Food Menu in Thai Language to Malay Language

Augmented reality (AR) technology is a technique that combines the real world and the virtual world digitally using mobile devices. Mobile AR technology is expected to help Malaysian tourists who have difficulties to understand the Thai language when visiting the country. Hence, a prototype called ARThaiMalay  translator was developed to translate printed Thai food menu to Malay language. The objective of this study is to design a food menu translation framework from Thai to Malay language based on mobile AR, develop a translator application and to test the effectiveness of the translator application. The prototype consists of three main components which are translation based on optical character recognition (OCR) technology, dictionary development using SQLite database  and display data from the local database. Evaluation of the developed application shows its effectiveness to perform translation of Thai text with certain features to Malay language

Analysis of the learning object-oriented programming factors

Students often feel overwhelmed by object-oriented programming courses. They find it difficult and complex to learn, requiring a high cognitive load to use the concepts in coding. These issues lead to demotivation in learning programming. This research aims to identify and verify factors that contribute to learning object-oriented programming from two perspectives: interviews and surveys. A literature review was conducted to identify these factors, followed by interviews with five experts who have been teaching object-oriented programming for over ten years to confirm them. Based on the interview results, a questionnaire was developed and administered to 31 bachelor students and 19 lecturers with master’s or doctorate degrees in computer science. The responses indicated that the identified factors were acceptable, with scores ranging from 3.74 to 4.65. The outcomes of this study are a set of factors that should be considered in a programming environment to improve the teaching and learning of object-oriented programming and make it more accessible and engaging for students

Dynamic Virtual Machine Allocation Policy for Load Balancing using Principal Component Analysis and Clustering Technique in Cloud Computing

The scalability and agility characteristics of cloud computing allow load balancing to reroute workload requests easily and to enhance overall accessibility. One of the most important services for cloud computing is Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS). There is a large number of physical hosts in a cloud data center for IaaS and it is quite difficult to arrange the allocation of the workload requests manually. Therefore, different load balancing methods have been proposed by researchers to avoid overloaded physical hosts in the cloud data center. However, fewer works have used multivariate analysis in cloud computing environment for considering the dynamic changes of the computing resources. Thus, this work suggests a new Virtual Machine (VM) allocation policy for load balancing by using a multivariate technique, Principal Component Analysis (PCA), and clustering technique. Moreover, PCA and clustering techniques were simulated on a cloud computing simulator, CloudSim. In the proposed allocation policy, a group of VMs were dynamically allocated to physical hosts. The allocation was based on the clusters of hosts according to their similar features in computing resources. The clusters were formed using PCA and a clustering technique based on variables related to the physical hosts such as Million Instructions Per Second (MIPS), Random Access Memory (RAM), bandwidth and storage. The results show that the completion time for all tasks has decreased, and the resource utilization has increased. This will optimize the performance of cloud data centers by effectively utilizing the available resources

Aluminium Process Fault Detection and Diagnosis

The challenges in developing a fault detection and diagnosis system for industrial applications are not inconsiderable, particularly complex materials processing operations such as aluminium smelting. However, the organizing into groups of the various fault detection and diagnostic systems of the aluminium smelting process can assist in the identification of the key elements of an effective monitoring system. This paper reviews aluminium process fault detection and diagnosis systems and proposes a taxonomy that includes four key elements: knowledge, techniques, usage frequency, and results presentation. Each element is explained together with examples of existing systems. A fault detection and diagnosis system developed based on the proposed taxonomy is demonstrated using aluminium smelting data. A potential new strategy for improving fault diagnosis is discussed based on the ability of the new technology, augmented reality, to augment operators’ view of an industrial plant, so that it permits a situation-oriented action in real working environments

Primary and Secondary School Students Perspective on Kolb-based STEM Module and Robotic Prototype

The aim of this paper is to assess students' perceptions of their competency and interests in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) throughout Malaysia. These perceptions are obtained during and after they were engaged in using a STEM module and building a robotic prototype that was in line with the STEM teachers' specification, and was conducted at the National Science Centre, Malaysia. This activity was undertaken because the target ratio for the number of students enrolling in STEM programs is not met. The developed STEM module is based on four stages of the learning cycle in Kolb's experiential learning theory. The stages are Concrete Experience, Reflective  Observation, Abstract Conceptualization, and Active Experimentation. These stages have five key educational activities which are watching videos, reading modules, assembling robotic components, drag and drop using blockly software and lastly playing a robotic game.  The key element of the activities is the utilisation of a robotic prototype as the main component in increasing the students’ interest in STEM via games. This module was evaluated in both qualitative and quantitative case studies of students to inform teachers’ perceptions of the developed modules and robotic prototypes. Data were collected through two training events at a science exhibition at the National Science Centre and taken from two distinct groups, namely primary and secondary school students in range 11 to 15 year old. The evaluation comprised of five areas which were interaction, engagement, challenge, competency and interest. The results show that developed module and robotic prototype based n teacher’s perception received positive response from the respondents. It can efficiently raise students’ interest in STEM that meets the Malaysia Education Blueprint 2013-2025.

A Review of Multimodal Interaction Technique in Augmented Reality Environment

Augmented Reality (AR) has proposed several types of interaction techniques such as 3D interactions, natural interactions, tangible interactions, spatial awareness interactions and multimodal interactions. Usually, interaction technique in AR involve unimodal interaction technique that only allows user to interact with AR content by using one modality such as gesture, speech, click, etc. Meanwhile, the combination of more than one modality is called multimodal. Multimodal can contribute to human and computer interaction more efficient and will enhance better user experience. This is because, there are a lot of issues have been found when user use unimodal interaction technique in AR environment such as fat fingers. Recent research has shown that multimodal interface (MMI) has been explored in AR environment and has been applied in various domain. This paper presents an empirical study of some of the key aspects and issues in multimodal interaction augmented reality, touching on the interaction technique and system framework. We reviewed the question of what are the interaction techniques that have been used to perform a multimodal interaction in AR environment and what are the integrated components applied in multimodal interaction AR frameworks. These two questions were used to be analysed in order to find the trends in multimodal field as a main contribution of this paper. We found that gesture, speech and touch are frequently used to manipulate virtual object. Most of the integrated component in MMI AR framework discussed only on the concept of the framework components or the information centred design between the components. Finally, we conclude this paper by providing ideas for future work involving this field

User Satisfaction for an Augmented Reality Application to Support Productive Vocabulary Using Speech Recognition

The aim of this paper is to evaluate user satisfaction based on System Usability Scale (SUS) questionnaire on Augmented Reality (AR) application for productive vocabulary using speech recognition. There is still lack of research focus on user satisfaction towards the use of AR-based app using speech recognition for vocabulary learning in early education. The first objective of this paper is to develop an AR application for children using speech recognition to enhance productive vocabulary learning that integrates visual script (orthography) and audio (phonology). The second objective is to evaluate and identify the user satisfaction in enhancing productive vocabulary methods by combining AR technology and speech recognition to the parents and teachers by doing a mixed method testing such as questionnaire and interview. To achieve this, an interview session was conducted with the experts and SUS questionnaire was given to the teachers and parents of the student to evaluate user satisfaction. The results show that the research hypotheses of this study were successfully achieved. It revealed that the teachers and students were satisfied with the application based on SUS score (SUS score > 68). Since the total SUS score is 80.3, which is above average, it shows that they were satisfied with the overall application. Apart from that, the mean of the usability study based on questionnaire also shows that the users have found that this application is usable in terms of learnability study and that this application is easy to use