The EuroPLOT project (2010-2013) has been funded to explore the concept of persuasive design for learning and teaching. It has developed Persuasive Learn-ing Objects and Technologies (PLOTs), manifested in two tools and a set of learning objects that have been tested and evaluated in four different case studies. These PLOTs will be shown in this demonstration, and the participants can try them out and experience for themselves the impact of persuasive technology that is embedded in these PLOTs. This will be one authoring tool (PLOTMaker) and one delivery tool (PLOTLearner). Furthermore, there will be learning objects shown which have been developed for those four different case studies. All of these PLOTs have already been tested and evaluated during case studies with real learners

Behringer, R

de Rosa Carstensen, I

Mikulecká, J

Smith, C

Soosay, M

Sørensen, CG

Winther-Nielsen, M

Winther-Nielsen, N

Øhrstrøm, P

Čech, P

English

Leeds Beckett Repository 

© Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013 
Demonstration of PLOTs from the EuroPLOT project 
 
Reinhold Behringer1, Carl Smith3, Mekala Soosay1, Jaroslava Mikulecká4, Pavel 
Čech4, Nicolai Winther-Nielsen5, Christian Grund Sørensen2, Margrethe Winther-
Nielsen6, Ilaria de Rosa Carstensen6, Peter Øhrstrøm2
1Leeds Metropolitan University 
{r.behringer, 
m.soosay}@leedsmet.ac.uk 
 
2Aalborg University 
{burri,poe, 
cgrund}@hum.aau.dk 
 
3London Metropolitan University 
carl.smith@londonmet.ac.uk 
 
4University of Hradec Králové 
jaroslava.mikulecka@uhk.cz 
 
5Fjellhaug International University Col-
lege Denmark 
nwn@dbi.edu 
 
6DHI 
mwn@dhigroup.com 
 
7Danube University Krems 
erich.herber@donau-
uni.ac.at 
 
 
Abstract. The EuroPLOT project (2010-2013) has been funded to explore the 
concept of persuasive design for learning and teaching. It has developed Persua-
sive Learning Objects and Technologies (PLOTs), manifested in two tools and a 
set of learning objects that have been tested and evaluated in four different case 
studies. These PLOTs will be shown in this demonstration, and the participants 
can try them out and experience for themselves the impact of persuasive technol-
ogy that is embedded in these PLOTs. This will be one authoring tool (PLOT-
Maker) and one delivery tool (PLOTLearner). Furthermore, there will be learning 
objects shown which have been developed for those four different case studies. 
All of these PLOTs have already been tested and evaluated during case studies 
with real learners.  
Keywords: Persuasive Design, persuasive technology, eLearning, learning ob-
jects, case studies 
1 Background (Pedagogy) 
In his seminal introduction of the concept of Persuasive Technology (PT), BJ Fogg 
[1] has identified several core principles of persuasive design. These seven persuasive 
design principles are: Reduction, Tunneling, Tailoring, Suggestion, Self-monitoring, 
Surveillance, and Conditioning. Related to these principles is Kairos which stems from 
Greek philosophers (Aristotle) and means the “opportune moment or place” to perform 
a persuasive action. These principles have been embedded in our tools for authoring 
and delivering learning objects, as well as in the learning objects themselves. Eu-
roPLOT [2] has the aim to use these principles for learning and teaching and explore 
their effectiveness.  
2 Background (Technology) 
The authoring tool PLOTMaker (http://www.glomaker.org) [3] uses a graphical in-
terface to create a flow of actions and presentations that engage the learner. This con-
sists of an authoring environment for the teacher and a player for the learner which can 
play the learning objects. Supported is Windows and Android.  
The delivery tool PLOTLearner [5] is actually a set of technologies, focused on 
learning that involves large texts. The underlying EMDROS database [4] handles an 
annotated text corpus, and the tool can then present to the learner excerpts from these 
texts that have a context and are semantically structured. This can be used for example 
for language grammar learning.  
The learning objects that have been developed with PLOTMaker are accessed by the 
learner through the PLOTMaker player. The persuasive design elements which have 
been embedded in those learning objects, are in the design and the structure of the 
learning content rather than in the use of specific technology. There is one exception, 
and this is the location-based Augmented Reality concept which inherently realizes the 
concept of Spatial Kairos. 
3 Results and outcomes achieved 
The tools and the learning objects have been developed iteratively, and have been 
tested and evaluated in four case studies: 
3.1 Academic Business Computing 
This case study is undertaken in the framework of database teaching in academic 
computer courses which are taught at two universities. The learning objects in these 
courses are developed with the tool PLOTMaker and are focusing on teaching basic 
SQL. The goal of this case study is to demonstrate the applicability of this approach in 
two different countries and languages (English in UK, Czech in Czech Republic). The 
specific topic of these learning objects is database normalization and SQL querying, 
and the main persuasive principles used in the PLOT’s design are reduction and inter-
activity. 
3.2 Language Learning 
This case study investigated the learning of language with the help of a large corpus 
of text. The learning tool PLOTLearner was specifically developed for this kind of 
learning with a large text repository (data-driven learning) from annotated texts. The 
language to be taught is Ancient Hebrew. Due to the difficulty of this language, this 
provides a valuable example of showing how a language with a different visual writing 
system can be taught effectively to students through the engagement with a large struc-
tured text corpus. 
3.3 Mediating Kaj Munk 
The Danish writer and vicar Kaj Munk (1898-1944) has produced a significant oeu-
vre of plays and other texts, all of which is archived in the Kaj Munk Archive in Aalborg 
University.  In addition, there is a Kaj Munk Museum in his old Vicarage in Vedersø 
(Denmark). Learners who want to inform themselves about life and work of this writer 
can do so through several methods developed in the EuroPLOT project: they can ex-
plore the writings through an online Kaj Munk Study Edition that allows structured 
access through the EMDROS database of Kaj Munk’s works. Furthermore, at a tool has 
been developed which makes it possible to visit the Kaj Munk Museum virtually using 
mobile devices, hereby using computers as persuasive media with Augmented Reality 
(AR) technology. 
3.4 Chemical Substance Handling 
In an industrial context, employees often need training in how to implement and 
handle new regulatory demands. This is especially important in the case of using chem-
ical substances which may be harmful. In the EuroPLOT project, DHI has used PLOT-
Maker to develop learning objects which teach adult learners in an industrial context 
how to handle such dangerous chemicals. This considers health and safety aspects, and 
the persuasion of the learning objects is implemented through tailoring and simulation.  
4 Demonstration outline 
The demonstration at EC-TEL will show all the PLOTs that have been developed in 
the EuroPLOT project. This will be: 
 The authoring tool PLOTMaker, showing how persuasive learning objects 
can be created. 
 The delivery tool PLOTLearner, showing how large text databases can be 
used for persuasive learning. 
 The persuasive learning objects for chemical handling, and business com-
puting learning, created with PLOTMaker. 
 A video of the Kaj Munk museum site showing the use of the Augmented 
Reality learning objects. 
 The access of Kaj Munk’s works through a PLOTLearner implementation. 
 Ancient Hebrew language learning with PLOTLearner.  
 
Participants can try out hands-on demonstrations of all these technologies. 
 
5 Specific technology and environment needed at conference 
We will bring one laptop computer, which will be able to show all the technologies 
to the demonstration audience / participants. This means we need 240V power and a 
table. Also required is wireless internet access (Wi-Fi). We will demonstrate all PLOTs 
sequentially on this one single machine. 
If another desktop computer (running Windows) would be available, then we could 
scale the demonstration and show several of the PLOTs simultaneously. At least the 
Kaj Munk video could then be shown in a loop while the other demonstrations could 
be tried out by the participants. 
 
Acknowledgements. The EuroPLOT project was funded by the Education, Audio-
visual and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA) of the European Commission through 
the Lifelong Learning Program with grant #511633. 
References 
1. Fogg, BJ: Persuasive Technology - Using Computers to Change What We Think and Do. 
2003, San Francisco: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers (2003) 
2. EuroPLOT: Persuasive Learning Objects and Technologies. http://www.eplot.eu/ (2010) 
3. GLOMAKER:  http://www.glomaker.org/ (2013) 
4. Emdros. Emdros - the database for analyzed and annotated text. http://emdros.org/ (2013) 
5. PLOTLearner 2: http://www.ezer.dk/3ETusersguide/PL-2.0.1/en/intro.php (2012) 


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