Facilitating Engagement in Educational Software - Assignment Example

Does narrative facilitate engagement in educational software? Abstract Narrative is an innate element of people’s lives and it helps them to exchange their personal experiences and culture. It is a primary way of thinking and explicit way of disclosing a story. Narrative is the “act” and not the “objects” of an effective conversational story telling. Narrative shows the important points of two or more events and its relationship to one another. The development of interfaces with narrative controls is imperative and priceless in an interactive system for the reason that humans have narrative brains. Narrative can “make meaning” in video and hypermedia based learning by serving as an organizing structure thus narrative has become the central model of justification, conjecture, and application in educational technology within the cognitive and social science, and cultural research. 1. Introduction The objective of educational software is to enhance the knowledge of young students effectively and narrative is essential to the method in which we make sense of text. Many believe that it provides the structure and consistency required to attain a higher level of learning. However, does it really facilitate engagement in education software? The following discussion aims to provide clarity to the narrative approach in educational software development and the relationship between narratives and humans, and its connections with effectual learning. It will also discuss the usability issues of educational software and the importance of narrative to interactive system design. More importantly, it will present the various requirements for using narrative approach by teachers and the theories behind successful educational software. 2. Narrative a. Definition of Narrative “Narratives are everywhere, performing countless, different functions in human interaction” (Toolan 2001, Preface). What is about narrative that makes it such an all-encompassing and enthralling trend? In search of definition, we found innumerable construal and idea about this subject. For instance, Davis (1998, p.11) while referring to other works gave varying definitions of narrative, one is Brunner (1990) idea that narrative is an innate element of people lives. He added that it is a tool to help people exchange their personal experiences and culture, and because narrative gives people chance to recognize and understand their environment, it is becoming man’s primary way of thinking. Similarly, Collins and Mulholland (2002, p.1) also referring to the works of Brook (1996) defined narrative as an explicit way of disclosing a story which on the other hand are events and people and objects exposed in a conceptual space. This means people can tell a story in a diverse or ‘innovative’ way to create an impression and receive reactions. Conversely, Madej (2003, p.2) used Polkinghorne (1998) argument that the main idea of narrative is “the act” and “not the objects” and it should be reliant on people and culture. Narratives encourage teamwork and sharing of stories is a vital method in community learning (Mullholland and Collins 2001, p.3). Although there are varying definitions of narrative, all of them seem to lead to ‘effective’ conversational story telling. Norrick (2000, p.1) elucidates that one “conversationalist becomes the storyteller, while the other become listeners”. The teller introduces the story to acquire listener curiosity, secure control of the floor, and guarantee an acceptance. He must outline memorized materials into a spoken presentation designed for the present situation. Moreover, even with listener disruption or attempts to be co-storyteller, story recipients can clearly recognize and assess the story with corresponding stories of their own. Narrative therefore boosts customary or everyday conversation to intensify listener’s concentration and promote enhanced comprehension of the story or the subject matter in focus (p.1). b. History of Narrative The practice in narrative theory according to Norrick (2000, p.1) was forged by Lavov & Waletzky in 1967 to provide a way of scrutinizing the internal structure of stories. However, since most narrative practice is interview-style based, it requires further broadening to explain the conversational materialization of stories. However, Lavov and Waletzky in 1972 and in 1997 released ‘Language in the Inner City’ and ‘Journal of Narrative and Life’ respectively to broaden and fortify their theory. According to their theory, the spoken version of personal experience is the usual narratives of ordinary speakers and the source of primary narrative structures. Their argument and analysis is based on the acuity of a delimited set of constant patterns and the exclusion of what they think is local divergence in the pursuit of a more reflective structural relationship (Toolan 2001, p.143). However, Polkinghorne (1988) delivers a more understandable description of narrative that in his view is fashioned by observing, “something is a part of some whole and that something is the source of something else” which is focused on those “rudimentary aspects of experience that concern human actions or events that affect human beings” (p.6). Newman (2005) explains that narrative predisposition is a “species-wide trait” (p.145) and it some way provided early humans with some unique ability to cope with changes. This narrative ability seems to be correlated with humans speaking ability, communication, and simple narrative scripts similar to the gestural communication of pre-speaking hominids or the great apes. However, humans rapidly develop their cognitive potential and become capable of handling even complicated narrative scripts. It is then when gestural communication was improved by new modes of expression like expressive painting, ritual dances, and oral narratives (p.145). c. Narrative and Human We are humans and “what we experience is a consequence of the action of our organizing schemes on the components of our involvement with the world” (Polkinghorne 1988, p.13). Narrative seems to be the basic scheme for linking individual human actions and events into unified aspects of a comprehensible combination. For instance, Polkinghorne (1998) explains that the action of a narrative scheme unites the two distinct events “the father died” and “the son cried” into a single event (p.13). He added that this could be stated as “the son cried when his father died”, and considering this events together enhance our comprehension of the two. In other words, we can therefore think that his father’s death pains the son because he cares or love his father so much. In general, narrative displays the important points of two or more events and its relationship to one another” (Polkinghorne 1988, p.13). Newman (2005) describes the nature and nurture effect on a person’s personal traits in terms of switches. He explains that often times these switches were off in the absence of environmental activators. Our narrative ability is similar to other concealed human facility like face and language detection and emotional maturity. However, the factors that will trigger these switches depend on nurturing and effects of the environment in which during their developmental stages children are vulnerable. The strength of these factors will influence the narrative ability of children thus, timing is very important to avoid fatal consequences as receiving it after a certain age is may be too late and will never have the change to gain the ability again (p.145-146). The pervasiveness and the product of narrative schemes are ever-present in our lives, as they are part of our cultural and social environment. As an individual, we ourselves generate narrative metaphors in our daily conversations and transactions and for others concerning our preceding behaviour. Humans indeed developed some storied accounts that provide significance to the behaviour of others. Similarly, we use these narrative method to make sense of our choice by creating what (Polkinghorne 1988, p.14) called imaginative ‘what if’ situation. On the other side, we are challenged with stories in the course of our daily verbal exchange and encounters with the printed and optical media (Polkinghorne 1988, p.14; Toolan 2001, p.1). 3. Learning and Narrative a. Definition of Learning “Learning is commonly assumed as an individual process that has a beginning and an end, which is best separated from the rest of our activities, and a result of teaching” (Wenger 1999, p.3). However, in a conceptual perspective, Wenger (1999) asserts that there are various kinds of learning theory, each of them stress different characteristics of learning, and each is therefore constructive in diverse ways. This variations to some degree indicates the multidimensional predicaments of learning and basic disparities in postulation regarding the true character of knowledge, learning and learner, and consequently about what matters in learning (p.4). Learning, Wenger (1999) added is not actually a “separate activity and it is not something we do we do nothing else or stop doing when we do something else” (p.8). In learning, the more resistance students have, the less likely he will learn, and the more complicated method it will become in the perception of a student thus learning should be a voluntary and autonomous process (Goldberg 2005, p.43). Learning unknowingly exaggerates predominantly when we are in stunned by our sense of familiarity or when we face with challenges above our normal reaction capability, and when we want to fit into place some pristine practices or seek to interact with other culture and communities. There are also instances when people around us unambiguously place us in a state where the subject of learning becomes challenging and necessitate our concentration. For instance, in the course of our life, we normally are coerced to attend classes, memorize, take exams, and receive a diploma. However, not all situations that bring learning into focus brought us the knowledge we required thus learning needs to be more effective. “Learning is something we can assume, whether it’s visible or not, whether we like the way it goes or not, whether what we are learning is to repeat the past or to shake it off” (Wenger 1999, p.8). In addition, even if we do not learn what we want, we are learning something else in the process. Learning is therefore not necessarily a scholastic activity and although its perception can definitely enlighten our academic exploration, it is applicable to our every day activities, our strategies, and “the technical, organizational, and educational systems we design” (Wenger 1999, p.8-11). “Learning is not something done to students, but something students do themselves” (Petty 2004, p.55). Learning according to Mulholland and Collins (2001) happens through the “active construction of meaning” (p.2) acquired through interactions with the environment. It is sometimes perceived as a social activity in which interactions with other members of the community are a fundamental ingredient of the practice. More importantly, learning needs motivation and the learner must accomplish a certain goal (p.2). However, many students, particularly leisurely learners, seems certain that in order to learn, all they have to do is be present at classes and carry out the activities more or less enthusiastically. Then they anticipate that learning follow automatically. This type of students are ‘passive learners’ and it will be describe in detail in the following section. b. Active Learner and Passive Receiver (Meaning and Differences) Learners according to Khosrowpour (2001) broadly can be classified active and passive learners. Passive learners in general are those who are silent and think critically in private, and do not participate verbally or discuss issues with teachers (p.1132; Goldberg 2005, p.43). At home, passive learning is obvious when parents are in charge for all learning conditions of their children. “Parents direct and children comply” (Goldberg 2005, p.43). “Passive learning too often results in no learning” (Moeller 2002, p.9). On the other hand, active learners are those students that are constantly arguing and seeking answers from their teacher, they are continually challenging other views and ideas alien to them (Khosrowpour 2001, p.1132). For instance, students have a propensity to find inquiring an ‘active’ and pleasurable action, mainly as giving correct answers boost their self-confidence and enjoy the sensations of achievement. Moreover, even those who are not selected to give the answer find it equally satisfying if they know they are competent of giving accurate answer for themselves (Petty 2004, p.192). More importantly, active learning is not just excitements and confidence for students, but normally leads to enhanced academic progress (Goldberg 2005, p.44). Passive learning has quite a few restrictions such as diminishing student’s attention with in the course of the class. Moreover, it only fascinates those who are contented with listening or learning without participation. It also has a tendency to endorse recessed learning and it take for granted the idea of individual learning, as it assumes that every students could do with the same information simultaneously. Active learning however is the reverse as it dares the students to learn how to utter information in their own words using their verbal skill. It encourages students to demonstrate their own thought using their own paradigm and perceive the correlation between previous and present knowledge. They therefore learns to raise valid questions and look for information to find the underlying cause of the problems in order to get their factual meaning (Moeller 2002, p.9-10). c. Usability and Narrative Usability of interactive systems for omnipresent computing is a fundamental feature of future software developments since the challenge in user interface development is no longer to put into operation a sole user interface from specifications but to a certain extent enable user interfaces for a broad assortment of strategies and “multimodal input channels” (Forbrig 2002, p.5). Furthermore, installing identical user interface transversely to a broad collection of strategies, applications, and platforms produces some doubts as to extract universal interaction components and configurations across the varied occurrence of the user interface, while safeguarding consistency (Forbrig 2002, p.5). In an interactive design, all user model actions are protected by a signal representing the existence of information suggesting its appropriate action hence if the control is not labelled then the user model will probably take no action. It is therefore essential to a user model to have labelled controls to ensure usage. However, labels are not necessarily written, as the form of control is enough to guarantee the signal being asserted. For instance, the coin slot needs no explanation or a label since it is clearly for inserting a coin. However, any approach to this type of labels would need to be determined by a usability authority by means of harmonizing techniques since these controls are required to be detectable at times and situations where actions must be taken by the user model (Forbrig 2002, p.13). Usability according to MacFarlane et. al. (2005) is an essential element in determining if an educational software design will help in the attainment of certain knowledge. On the other hand, as far as ISO 9241-11 is concern, usability is the extent of usefulness of a certain product to achieve particular goals within a specified context of a certain user with success and satisfaction. This is essential since a system that is very difficult to use may hamper the ability of a user to absorb material offered by the system (p.103). Achieving a particular goal and attaining a certain level of knowledge is perhaps the most important objective of any educational software thus, development of interfaces with narrative controls are valuable. Narrative is imperative in an interactive system for the reason that “humans have narrative brains” (Newman 2005, p.145). In addition, Steiner and Tomkins (2004) believe that interactive systems offer new prospect for narrative presentation since user may take control of the different facet of the environment. It is unlike written or cinematic narratives where the author takes control instead of the user himself or herself (p.46). “Narration is an important part of play” (Kanjo and Astheimer 2002, p.1) since children are actively producing their own understanding of the things around them when they are getting involved in storytelling. They can also work out effective language and thinking skills predominantly when there are others like them who are working together in making the story. According to Boling (2004), students experience noticeable change and transformation when taught using storylines. Storylines, she added provides an internal structure for presentation that allow learners to develop an “overall meaning” from their educational encounter. In this manner, narrative provides a significant organizing function for the students (p.193-194). Furthermore, it acted as a way of “making meaning” from students educational encounters and alter their perception of literacy lessons. For instance, narrative can “make meaning” in video and hypermedia based learning by serving as an organizing structure. In one study according to Boling (2004), students responses to video and clips suggest how viewing, discussing, and reflecting upon enhances support to teachers candidates in their learning. Conversely, students struggle when learning is not perfect and they are trying hard to make personal connections to what they see and apparently lacking support. Boling (2004) while referring to the works of Laurillard (1998) emphasizes that interactive multimedia resource is simply not narrative in structure. She added that many commercially available interactive multimedia resources do not offer enough provisions for all learning activities necessary in acquiring a significant objective. They are merely option choices, multimedia data, and a non-narrative medium that are perceived by students as just an operational program. Consequently, their concentration is primarily focus on all syntax related activities and operational features of the interface. As a result, even with a powerful and emotional material, they are still very much occupied with the operational facet of the process. These students apparently need support in this very significant phase of preserving a narrative storyline otherwise; they will only get “action-feedback” that represents nothing but browsing (p.198). Newman (2005) claims that in many important researches, narrative in interactive systems and games are momentous. It is because human’s cognition and appreciation are based on narratives thus software developers nowadays are persuaded to create programs or interactive systems based on the narrative philosophy. Story making is quite an enjoyable activity as in a more profound sense, humans view the world with storytelling brains (p.145). d. Requirements for using narrative approach by teachers “Education narratives haunt real classrooms like ghost and invisibly distort all students’ and teachers’ notions about what education is for, how it should be conducted, and what kind of experience it should provide” ( Marshall 2007, p.8). In this statement, Marshall (2007) is trying to explain that people insists that stories are simply informal and not in any way affects their heart and mind. However, people seem to ignore that their frame of mind whenever they watch or view an entertainment, is the same frame of mind that could influence them unaware. For instance, almost everyone can readily name a movie or any presentation and often affectionately admit that it has influenced them one way or another. This is apparently a contradiction to their earlier claims that stories never affect them (p.8). The truth is stories can “invite our assent without commanding it” (Marshall 2007, p.8). We just find it easier to disregard the reality that we almost do agree with the story and we accept its provocation to feel, believe, and judge. Teaching through narratives according to Ferdig (2004), needs to focus on three major steps. Teachers who wants to teach using narrative approach should provide “space for students” to impart their stories as this will enable students to comprehend their origin and anchor themselves on stable grounds. Students need to develop their teleography thus teachers must allocate ways and space for them, as they need to perceive themselves as persons with skills acquired in teaching lessons. More importantly, there should be documentation and an evaluation of their growth order to provide significant evidence or data for teacher’s assessments and research for better narrative teaching. However, observably, this is just applicable in certain teaching situations and teachers must not use too much effort on storied curriculum but it is necessary to alter their traditional perception of learners and the narratives they produce. Teachers must be aware that there is a constant and evolving development of stories among their students and there are circumstances that customary stories can be a teaching tool or a technique for evaluation (p.488). 4. Educational Software Theories a. Definition of Educational Software “The objective of educational software for children is to provide an engaging learning environment and keeping children’s attention by providing fun” (MacFarlane et. al. 2005, p.2). Fun particularly with children is normally achieved through games but adopting computer technology into education has its own danger—by being perceived as fun and entertainment, learning devaluates considerably (MacFarlane et. al. 2005, p.2). The result of some research, according to Baroni et. al. (2006), computer technology can considerably provide high-level of learning and it is helpful in the development of decisive thinking skills, analysis, and systematic inquisition. However, computers alone do not guarantee its usefulness thus; it needs some form of cognitive characteristics. It should promote active engagement, group participation, and recurrent interaction and feedback. On the other hand, there are evidence that visualization, modelling, simulation, and 3D graphics in computer-based applications or educational software are influential tools for teaching various subjects (p.350). Since the critical feature of various learning environment centres on the role of teachers, educational software should “foster a move from teacher centred to learner centred pedagogies” (Squires 1999, p.2). In general, educational software is fun, learning, and an influential tool in teaching. b. Types of designing educational software In the development of educational software, education experts have acquired more familiarity with computer-based technology. Consequently, changes particularly the transformation from behaviourist paradigm and artificial intelligence approach to a pedagogical constructivist view. In the early years, the behaviourist paradigm dominates the idea of computer-assisted learning and later during the 1980s; artificial intelligence emerged and promote the concept of intellectual tutoring system. All these systems attempt to develop suitable and significant models for the learner and teacher but they fail. Developing a realistic learner and teacher models has been obstinate and this is the reason why artificial intelligence method has been terminated. Educational experts believe that constructivism is far better since it offers a considerable number of ways to enhance learning realistically. Many published articles focused on better educational software and better learning anticipate constructivism as its vehicle. (Squires 1999, p.2) The activity theory according to Burd (2001) is gaining attention from education and software engineering communities that deal with human and computer interactions. It is a theoretical framework in the design of educational software, which mainly deals with human activities and socio-cultural dynamics. Activity Theory is used to analyze various aspects of software design such as the hierarchical structure of the activity, its internalization and externalization, object oriented compliance, history and development, and mediation (p.6). Another approach in educational software design is through ‘scenarios’ which is according to Hobbs and Potts (2000) is well accepted by system designers and policy makers. In software development, ‘scenarios’ are used to find out the options available for design decisions and requirements. Human-computer interaction, object oriented designers, and business management communities have focused their resources in user centred design that employs scenarios throughout the 1990s. The reason is scenarios are significant in modelling management and enterprise and scenario-based risk assessment is an “effective cost-benefit analysis technique” (p.201) for identifying the future course of an organization. However, narrative has become the central model of justification, conjecture, and application in educational technology within the cognitive and social science, and cultural research. Overall, scenarios enables decision-makers to test their hypothesis or study the “what if” situation in the project that is under consideration. The intention is simply to elucidate the connections between actions and features of a particular activity and to have a better understanding of the negative effects of such activity (p.201). 5. Conclusion Learning from the foregoing discussion, narrative approach to educational software indeed facilitates engagement. There are a number of reasons for choosing narrative as primary ingredient of interactive systems. First is the reality that humans are created with narrative brains and secondly, story telling invites curiosity and therefore increases knowledge absorption. The objective that educational software should provide an engaging environment is only possible through effective presentation, which is normally achieved through learner- centred teaching. Narrative provides the much needed “space for students” to impart their stories and develop an “overall meaning” from their educational encounter. Narrative links individual human actions and distinct events, and its relationship to one another. Achieving a specific goal and attaining a certain level of knowledge is indeed the most important objective of educational software and therefore development of interfaces with narrative controls is imperative and priceless in any interactive systems. 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Copyright 2004 ACM 1-58113-815-6/04/0001 Toolan Michael J., 2001, Narrative: A Critical Linguistic Introduction, Published 2001 Routledge, ISBN 0415231752 Wenger Etienne, 1999, Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity, Published 1999 Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0521663636 Read More