Molecular and Cellular Biology Animations: Development and Impact on Student Learning

Educators often struggle when teaching cellular and molecular processes because typically they have only two-dimensional tools to teach something that plays out in four dimensions. Learning research has demonstrated that visualizing processes in three dimensions aids learning, and animations are effective visualization tools for novice learners and aid with long-term memory retention. The World Wide Web Instructional Committee at North Dakota State University has used these research results as an inspiration to develop a suite of high-quality animations of molecular and cellular processes. Currently, these animations represent transcription, translation, bacterial gene expression, messenger RNA (mRNA) processing, mRNA splicing, protein transport into an organelle, the electron transport chain, and the use of a biological gradient to drive adenosine triphosphate synthesis. These animations are integrated with an educational module that consists of First Look and Advanced Look components that feature captioned stills from the animation representing the key steps in the processes at varying levels of complexity. These animation-based educational modules are available via the World Wide Web at http://vcell.ndsu.edu/animations. An in-class research experiment demonstrated that student retention of content material was significantly better when students received a lecture coupled with the animations and then used the animation as an individual study activity

The Evolution of a Case-Based Computational Approach to Knowledge Representation, Classification, and Learning

Problem Categories The abstract problem categories include a set of concepts taken from Andersen Consulting's change management methodology and another set of common sense categories borrowed from the study of conventional, proverbial, wisdom. These categories provide an explicit way of organizing both the sets of problem-describing features, and the cases which are indexed by those features. The abstract problem categories drawn from the change management methodology are called influence systems. They are a set of 22 categories with names like Vision, Image, and Planning. Each descriptor can take one of three values: Weak, Neutral, or Strong. The formal methodology consists largely of discovering features of the client's situation and using them to affirm the values of these influence systems. The influence systems provide an abstract characterization of the state of an organization, and the methodology associates general prescriptive advice with each of the 66 possible influence sys..

Learning by Learning Roles: a virtual role-playing environment for tutoring

People will invest extraordinary time and effort into learning how to play and win a game. Virtual role-playing environments can be a powerful mechanism of instruction, provided they are constructed such that learning how to play and win the game contributes to a player's understanding of real-world concepts and procedures. This paper describes a pedagogical architecture and an implemented application where students assume a role in a simulated multi-media environment and learn about the real world by competing with other players. The game, which teaches principles of micro-economics, is an implementation of a networked, multiplayer, simulation-based, interactive multi-media, educational environment that illustrates the principles of learning by learning roles. Keywords

Incremental Reminding: the Case-based Elaboration and Interpretation of Complex Problem Situations

When solving a complex problem, gathering relevant information to understand the situation and imposing appropriate interpretations on that information are critical to problem solving success. These two tasks are especially difficult in weak-theory domains -- domains in which knowledge is incomplete, uncertain, and contradictory. In such domains, experts may rely on experience for all aspects of problem solving. We have developed a case-based approach to problem elaboration and interpretation in such domains. An experience-based problem-solver should be able to incrementally acquire information and, in the course of that acquisition, be reminded of multiple cases in order to present multiple viewpoints to problems that present multiple faults. We are addressing issues of 1) elaboration and interpretation of complex problem situations; 2) multiple interpretations; and 3) the role of categories as the foci of reasoning in the context of the Organizational Change Advisor (ORCA). Its model..

A multi-user desktop virtual environment for teaching shop-keeping to children

Abstract Virtual role-playing environments can be a powerful mechanism of instruction, provided they are constructed such that learning how to play and win the game contributes to a player's understanding of real-world concepts and procedures. North Dakota State University (NDSU) provides students with environments to enhance their understanding of geology (Planet Oit), cellular biology (Virtual Cell), programming languages (ProgrammingLand), retailing (DollarBay), and history (Blackwood). These systems present a number of opportunities and an equal number of challenges. Players are afforded a role-based, multi-user, "learn-by-doing" experience, with software agents acting as both environmental effects and tutors, and the possibilities of multi-user cooperation and collaboration. However, cultural issues and technological constraints present a range of difficulties. The Dollar Bay environment, its particular challenges, and the solutions to these are presented