Affordances and Limitations of Immersive Participatory Augmented Reality Simulations for Teaching and Learning

Abstract

The informal learning environments of television, video games, and the Internet are producing learners with a new profile of cognitive skills. This profile features widespread and sophisticated development of visual-spatial skills, such as iconic representation and spatial visualization. A pressing social problem is the prevalence of violent video games, leading to desensitization, aggressive behavior, and gender inequity in opportunities to develop visual-spatial skills. Formal education must adapt to these changes, taking advantage of new strengths in visual-spatial intelligence and compensating for new weaknesses in higher-order cognitive processes: abstract vocabulary, mindfulness, reflection, inductive problem solving, critical thinking, and imagination. These develop through the use of an older technology, reading, which, along with audio media such as radio, also stimulates imagination. Informal education therefore requires a balanced media diet using each technology's specific strengths in order to develop a complete profile of cognitive skills.

Experimenting with electromagnetism using augmented reality: Impact on flow student experience and educational effectiveness

“…Each interactive technology has a set of features that facilitates particular approaches to educational practice (Choi & Baek, 2011;Conole & Dyke, 2004;Dalgarno & Lee, 2010;Dickey, 2005;Dunleavy et al, 2009;Kye & Kim, 2008;Lee et al, 2010;Wu et al, 2013). For instance, three-dimensional virtual world (3DVW), an interactive technology that shares relevant characteristics with augmented reality, offers representational fidelity and learning interaction as technical features (Chittaro & Ranon, 2007).…”

“…A positive impact of AR on emotions would improve students' cognitive processes and performance (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990;Efklides, Kuhl, & Sorrentino, 2001;Keller, 1979;Linnenbrink & Pintrich, 2002). Psychological states such as motivation, flow, cognitive benefits, reflection, and sense of presence are positively related to learning outcomes (Antonietti, Rasi, Imperio, & Sacco, 2000;Conole & Dyke, 2004;Dalgarno & Lee, 2010;Dunleavy et al, 2009;Lee et al, 2010). Due to the limited scope of this work, we concentrate our efforts on the observation of the psy-chological state in which an individual feels cognitively efficient, motivated, and happy, known as flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990), that has been widely recognized by many researchers as supportive of students' learning (Choi & Baek, 2011;Kye & Kim, 2008;Pearce et al, 2005).…”

“…Interactive technologies such as 3D virtual worlds (3DVWs) and augmented reality (AR) are potentially effective in promoting learning benefits (Conole & Dyke, 2004); they act through the mediation of usability and psychological states on learning outcomes (Choi & Baek, 2011;Dalgarno & Lee, 2010;Dickey, 2005;Dunleavy, Dede, & Mitchell, 2009;Kye & Kim, 2008;Lee, Wong, & Fung, 2010;Wu, Lee, Chang, & Liang, 2013). Therefore, an active area of research is the exploration of learning affordances offered by these emerging technol-ogies in different knowledge areas (Dalgarno & Lee, 2010;Mikropoulos & Natsis, 2011).…”

“…These technologies enable learners to interact with real objects in ways still to be discovered (Bujak et al, 2013;Cuendet, Bonnard, Do-Lenh, & Dillenbourg, 2013). However, high-quality user experiences are difficult to achieve and interaction with the learning environment should help, not hinder the teaching-learning process (Dunleavy et al, 2009;Zaharias, 2003). Many studies A full history of emotional states that emerging technologies might foster on learning activities is beyond the scope of this work.…”

The impact of coupled games on the learning experience of learners at-risk: An empirical study

“…While young adults conduct a substantial part of their lives via the mobile phone, schools and universities have long pursued other forms of educational interaction and contact [2]. However, for nearly half a decade now, digital and in particular pervasive game-based learning scenarios have started to gain traction among educational practitioners [3][4] [5].…”