Learning by Playing An Edutainment 3D Environment for Schools

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Online meetings take place in a virtual environment based on 3D graphics: two students per class .... Q 11 and 12: which game did you enjoy best? Do you have ...
Learning by Playing An Edutainment 3D Environment for Schools Nicoletta Di Blas, Paolo Paolini, Caterina Poggi Politecnico di Milano (Italy) {diblas, paolini, poggi}@elet.polimi.it

Abstract: SEE (concerning “Dead Sea Scrolls” and related issues such as history, religion, philosophy, literature, etc.), is a very effective learning environment intended for a worldwide audience, of students from 12 to 19 years of age. A massive experimental-delivery phase during spring 2003 (involving more than 700 students and 40 teachers, from Italian and Israeli schools) has shown an impressive educational impact, far beyond our own expectations. One of the most surprising findings has been the wide-range impact (from motivation, to organization of learning activities, to specific interest in the subject matter, etc.) and that the effect was felt far beyond the limit of the experience, in the sense that it propagated to other learning activities and it lasted long after the SEE experience was completed. The paper briefly describes SEE, at the heart of which lies a 3D world shared over the Internet. The core of the paper is the description of the remarkable educational benefits detected during the experimental delivery, and a tentative analysis of the possible causes explaining such effectiveness.

1. Introduction The SEE project is the result of cooperation between Politecnico di Milano and the Israel Museum, Jerusalem. SEE is a quite complex edutainment experience: traditional learning activities (such as studying, homework, field researches, etc.) are interspersed with a very innovative edutainment activity, based on a 3D “virtual world” shared over Internet. During the experience (typically lasting 6-7 weeks) each class meets four times with 3 other classes, in the 3D virtual world. During virtual meetings students play, discuss, get acquainted with each other, answer quizzes, present their own cultural and social environment, etc. SEE was conceived keeping in mind four major educational goals: - Providing rich, in-depth cultural content, about the “Dead Sea Scrolls”, and a number of related issues - Favouring cross-cultural encounters among students of different socio-cultural environments - Offering interaction, fun and engagement (as motivators for traditional learning efforts) - Encouraging the use of innovative Information and Communication Technologies for educational purposes The experimentation (in the spring of 2003) has shown that all the major goals were achieved and, quite surprisingly for us, a wider educational impact was generated. The rest of the paper briefly introduces the SEE structure, gives a detailed account of the experimentation, describes how feedbacks from students and teachers were collected and eventually discusses the educational benefits of the project.

2. How the Experience Works Lack of space prevents us from giving a detailed description of the “SEE Experience”, that can be found in (Di Blas, Paolini, Poggi, 2003b); we provide here only a synthetic view of it. Each SEE experience involves four classes of students from 12 to 19 years of age, from different socio-cultural environments. The content of the Experience concerns the Dead Sea Scrolls1 and related knowledge: a perfect point of departure to talk about culture in a broader sense, with a global approach and a strong interdisciplinary potential. The experience lasts 6 weeks: during this period the students perform a number of learning activities that lead them from a non-existent (or mild) knowledge of the Scrolls’ world, through a more in-depth view on some topic of 1

Manuscripts written between 2nd century BC and 68 AD by a community of Hebrew Essenes, who lived in the Judean desert near the archeological site of Khirbet Qumran, not far from Jerusalem (Roitman 1997). They represent the earliest known version of books from the Bible, and an invaluable source for understanding the roots of Western civilization.

interest, to an interiorised reflection on the ties connecting a two-thousand-years-old society with their own present culture. If the actual learning activity is quite traditional, the novelty lies in four “on-line meetings” (Fig. 1) that give the pace to the whole experience. Online meetings take place in a virtual environment based on 3D graphics: two students per class, represented by avatars (i.e. graphical representations of the users) “enter” the virtual world in order to meet the other classes and a “guide”.

Figure 1: SEE activities timeline. In the first session, students get a general introduction to the historical-geographical context of the Experience, and especially to the other students with whom they will collaborate in the following weeks (Figs. 2-3).

Figure 2: Avatars in the 3D world introduce themselves during the first online session. By clicking on the board labelled “class 1”, a pop-up window opens showing a class self-presentation.

Figure 3: Class picture in a sample class presentation. A teacher commented: “It was exciting for the students to see the boys and girls of the other class. They are right there, and yet so faraway at the same time…”

Before the next meeting, students are required to study background material on the Dead Sea Scrolls and the community who wrote them in Qumran. Contents – which are downloaded in printable format from SEE website – consist of a set of interviews to leading experts of the Scrolls, Ancient Literature, and related issues. Unlike usual school textbooks, interviews provide a faceted, thought-provoking overview of the current state of research at academic level, and yet in a readable, straightforward style. Students are confronted with different opinions on the same issue, and stimulated to investigate on the criteria on which each hypothesis is based. Interviews are integrated by a set of auxiliary material (summaries, anthological excerpts, insets on relevant historical characters or events). During the second session, students enter the kernel of the experience – and they also enter the virtual museum, where the Scrolls are preserved (Fig. 4). Themes previously studied are recalled through significant images related

to the Scrolls or the archaeological site of Qumran (Fig. 5) and discussed via chat among students under the active supervision of the guide (a tutor from SEE staff, also represented by an avatar).

Figure 4: Avatars in the corridor inside the virtual Shrine of the Book, a reproduction of the actual museum in Jerusalem, where the Scrolls are preserved. Boards (once clicked) show pictures of Qumran.

Figure 5: A board showing the stairs to the pools used for ritual baths by the inhabitants of Qumran.

The guide plays a critical role in coordinating the students (Chang 2002), making sure that no one gets lost or left behind, assigning penalties for rude behavior, and directing the activities. Each online session is carefully planned in advance, with a detailed schedule. To make the interaction effective, every single time slot is dedicated to a precise activity, and the guide makes sure that everyone keeps to it. The moment of discussion is immediately followed by the games: a Treasure Hunt, taking place in a labyrinth, and a Quiz. Classes are paired to form two teams, which start a contest that will end only after the final meeting. Competition is definitely the most engaging part of the experience, and a tremendous motivator for studying the contents: games in fact combine the fun of playing with the 3D world interactive features (Fig. 6) with the thrill of finding the solution to cultural riddles faster and better than the other team (Fig. 7). Although “physical” skill is required to succeed, no point is earned without a satisfactory answer to cultural enigmas. Thus, the eagerness of doing well in the games drives even the less study-inclined of the students to learn accurately their part of material, and give an active contribution to their team. Teachers reported, that even the least motivated of their students got engaged in the games and studied hard, in order to win.

Figure 6: An avatar performs one of the “Olympic Games” in the Quiz space. If he reaches the top of the ladder before his opponent, his team will earn the right to answer the Quiz question first.

Figure 7: Avatars reflect on the answer to question 1, which was shown by the guide in a pop-up window. Someone has won the first game, and the right to answer: he selects answer B.

The whole class stands behind those who perform the games at the computers, encouraging them, giving suggestions, cheering. Team spirit is strong, both inside the class and between the two classes of a team: games are designed to force interaction among remote members. After having studied in depth a specific aspect of the Scrolls’ culture (such as Life in a Community, or Rituals in Qumran), which is the theme of games and discussion in the third session, students are required to find analogous phenomena in their own local culture (e.g., the meaning and origins of some ritual which is part of their present reality). The two classes of each team work in tight collaboration, comparing their findings and reflecting on differences and similarities in their own cultures (Geer 2001). Moreover, in the course of the Experience one of the experts interviewed is available to answer participants’ questions on the website message board: a wonderful opportunity for the students to take part in – as a teacher defined it – “a debate at academic level”. During the fourth session, each class presents its homework in turn, while other students ask for details, make comments, agree or disagree on certain issues. Comparison among cultures and discussion about the meaning of different traditions make this moment the most culturally intense of the whole experience. At the end, the guide announces the final scorings – which obviously include the quality of the homework – and proclaims the winner.

3. Collection of Feedback SEE underwent a double experimental phase, between November 2002 and May 2003, which proved extremely useful and informative. It allowed the staff to assess the Experience’s features, detect and fix bugs, refine timings, interaction dynamics and organizational issues, find ideas and inspiration to improve the existing features. The first phase was devoted to testing the technical features and interaction dynamics, therefore mock-up contents were used; the second phase was a full-scope testing: contents, games, technical and organizational aspects, homework, timing between sessions, cooperation among schools, educational and learning issues were all put on trial. Phase 1: November-December 2002 7 schools (2 Humanities high schools, 3 middle schools, 1 Technical high school, 1 Professional high school), in Italy 13 classes (5 Humanities high schools, 4 Technical / Professional high schools, 4 middle schools) 15 teachers Over 200 students, from 12 to 19. Computer expertise varied with the kind of schools; however, accomplished computer-users were present in every class 15 sessions performed

Phase 2: March-May 2003 22 schools (12 Humanities high schools, 5 middle schools, 5 Technical / Professional high schools) in different parts of Italy and in Israel 36 classes (20 Humanities high schools, 8 Technical / Professional high schools, 8 middle schools) 44 teachers Over 700 students, from 12 to 19. Computer expertise varied with the kind of schools; however, accomplished computer-users were present in every class 36 sessions performed (each one involving 4 classes)

Observers monitored each session in every single school and registered notable aspects on written reports. At the end of the experimentation, a large amount of data was collected, through different techniques: 1. Direct observation of every session (observers’ reports) 2. Students Questionnaires after the final session – to evaluate the users satisfaction 3. Teachers Questionnaires after the final session – to assess the educational effectiveness 4. Focus groups with teachers (before, during and after the Experience) – to gather ideas on learning activities and materials, to monitor the educational effectiveness of sessions, to integrate and confirm results. 3.1 Direct Observation Monitoring cooperative sessions in presence proved a rich and reliable source of information for the staff; being with the students during the sessions, it was quite immediate for observers to assess the contents’ level of complexity, the effectiveness of interaction dynamics, and to understand the nature of problems (inadequateness of instructions, students’ lack of interest, scarce involvement of the teacher). Besides, neither teachers nor students would have been able to identify and describe several interaction problems that caused in them a generic sense of frustration, whereas staff observing the users was able to detect them. After witnessing a session, observers had to write an overall evaluation on a report, with precise feedback concerning the following aspects: interaction, content, and technology. As a methodological point, we learned that, as far as interaction is concerned, the direct observation of users’ behaviour is far more reliable than questionnaires. 3.2 Students’ Questionnaires After the end of the whole SEE experience, students were asked to fill in a questionnaire, sent to the teachers via email and then distributed in the classes. 226 questionnaires were filled in and sent back. Some of the questions had a 4-scale predefined set of answers (such as “a lot, enough, not so much, not at all”); others were just open questions, to collect opinions and suggestions. We shall focus now on a few of them: Q 6: would you be happy to repeat the SEE experience? 50% of the students declared themselves very keen on repeating the Experience; another 40% said they would be glad to do it again. Only 1% answered they absolutely wouldn’t. The main reason to repeat the Experience was the intercultural aspect, that is, the “possibility of meeting other students from different countries and cultures”; the second reason was the interest in the topic and the third one was the fun of the experience. Actually, as also the observers had reported, the most appreciated session turned out to be the fourth one, during which every group was required to present to the others a research and to discuss it, thus comparing different cultural points of view. Q 11 and 12: which game did you enjoy best? Do you have any suggestions or critiques about any game? The most appreciated game turned out to be the Quiz, that is, the one in which the rules were the clearest and the “physical”

and cultural part most clearly distinct (while the avatar was performing an ability game, the rest of the class got busy in trying to find the correct answer to the quiz). Students suggested making questions more difficult: they had studied hard and felt underestimated when questions were too easy. Q 17: which of the 4 sessions did you like the most? Session 4: 55 preferences; session 3: 27 pref.; session 2: 15 pref.; session 1: 14 pref. The outcomes, apart from confirming the fact that students liked discussing their homework in session 4, also show an ever-increasing interest and involvement in the activity, with a climax in the last meeting that evidently left them, so to speak, with a “good flavour”. Teachers’ Questionnaires and Focus Groups Teachers were involved in the design and assessment processes from the very first steps of the project. 5 focus groups were held to choose the cultural topics, structure online activities, define the format of the background material and of the homework; their contribution to the tuning of the project was invaluable. At the end of the experimental phase, questionnaires were distributed to all the teachers who had taken part in the project. 19 questionnaires were filled in and given back to us. On the whole, scores ranged from “good” to “ very good”, never scoring “very bad”. We then pursued our investigation asking teachers to express their opinion about students’ interaction (during the cultural discussions, the games and the preparation of the homework). It turned out that teachers would have appreciated more communication among the different schools involved in the experience outside the online sessions; they suggested that schools should be helped to keep in touch after the project’s end, possibly meeting in the “real” world. They found the interaction very engaging and a powerful stimulus for studying; moreover, the use of new technologies was a good occasion to couple “diligent” students with those more apt at interacting in a virtual environment, thus emphasizing their different skills (Gardner 1983). Particularly rewarding was the outcome of question 3 (How do you evaluate the educational impact of the experience?): 2 teachers judged the educational impact of the experience “excellent”, 8 scored it as “very good”, other 8 as “good”; only one scored it as bad, and none as “very bad”. The outcomes of the focus groups will be discussed in detail in the next paragraph.

4. Educational Benefits of SEE After the end of the experience, 3 in-depth focus groups with teachers were held. The purpose was to verify the educational impact of the project. The educational benefits of SEE can be divided into three groups, concerning respectively: 1) Content; 2) Students’ motivation and attitude; 3) Learning methodologies. 4.1 The Content Being the Dead Sea Scrolls an extra-curricular topic (although connected to several curricular themes), no specific comparison could be established to determine whether students involved in the project had learned “more” than those who were not. However, teachers who took part in SEE regarded it as a profitable experience, with a number of valuable learning outcomes – most of which could hardly be achieved through the traditional study approach. The interview format, unlike conventional school textbooks, conveys to students the flavour of a lively debate among scholars, each one putting forth her/his point of view on a specific issue. It enhances critical thinking, stimulating students to evaluate the different contributions, possibly assuming an opinion of their own. Teachers were thrilled to see how their students, startled by the conflicting opinions of different experts, were curious to find out which was the most convincing one: they eagerly did further research to investigate the criteria upon which the various opinions were based. Teachers say: “The interview approach is extremely interesting: it shows the state-ofthe-art of the research, a debate at academic level2”. SEE has a strong interdisciplinary potential. The Scrolls topic gives the opportunity to involve many different subjects, each one giving its special contribution to the participants’ understanding: History, Religion, Literature, English, Greek, Latin, Philosophy, Art History, Computer Sciences, etc. Discovering how many different disciplines, with their diverse criteria and methods, may converge on one single issue is intrinsically instructive. The interdisciplinary character of the project was in some cases one of the basic reasons for a school to register: “Among teachers, great emphasis was put on the interdisciplinary quality of the project. We discussed on how to involve as many subjects as possible: Italian Literature, English, and Religion. It was important for us to involve not only our students, but also our colleagues. If the class coordinator feels involved in the project, and works in collaboration with teachers of other subjects, this becomes a real strength. Students realize that the Experience is 2

Quotations from teachers’ statements (collected during focus groups) are reported between double quotes and in italic font.

multidisciplinary”. In some humanistic high schools, teachers adapted their program in order to introduce topics more related to the project: “I slightly modified the curricular program of History, Latin and Greek Literature, studying in depth the authors which had more to do with the project. We read Greek excerpts from the Genesis and Josephus Flavius […]; students were very curious about him, because they knew he had to do with the project”. The cross-cultural aspect of the SEE project is particularly evident when students present a research on their own culture, and during the cultural discussions. Cross-cultural encounters, besides being fascinating experiences, are also intensely educational ones: meeting someone who lives in a different cultural environment means learning a new, more accurate look on one’s everyday world. When pupils engage with peers (of their same age, and different culture) in discussions concerning relevant aspects of human societies - such as “holy celebrations” or “the meaning of sacrifice” -, exchanges among cultures become far more interesting: “The ‘otherness’ element, the meeting with other countries and cultures, is always stimulating. During the first session, it was exciting for the students to see themselves and the boys and girls of the other class. They are right there, and so faraway at the same time…” 4.2 Students’ Motivation and Attitude We can distinguish three main effects on motivation and attitude: a general increase in students’ care and diligence, the occasion for “bringing out” problematic students and the improvement of discipline. Competition, the desire of winning the games, the engagement of communicating with fellow students of different towns and countries, are powerful motivators for studying both the material and the language in which it is discussed during the sessions: “They read the interviews at home, then we discussed them in class; we inquired on the historical perspective, doing further research on the different opinions of the experts. I never threatened examinations; nevertheless they studied with great care to be prepared for the Experience. They probably wouldn’t have been so committed, without the games spur”. It was amazing to see how even very young students became deeply knowledgeable about “difficult” subjects concerning the history of Middle East, religious matters, etc. In SEE, interaction drives the content: the thrill of meeting peers from far away, the impression – given by the 3D virtual world - of “being there” with them in a remote country, the desire to win the games, play a crucial role. Teachers typically chose for experimenting SEE their most motivated, hardworking students; some teachers instead selected the pupils with the lowest inclination to study: “We chose our least motivated students, as we thought that, if the project worked, we had a chance of ‘rescuing’ them. And so it happened”. The innovative teaching-learning style proposed by SEE offered disaffected students an opportunity to show their commitment: “All of them participated with enthusiasm. Even two kids with comprehension problems had studied well and knew everything”. Of the many different skills pupils possess, only few are evaluated in “traditional” school activities. A different learning approach gives these ‘hidden talents’ a chance to emerge, and such abilities are extremely appreciated by the class. Teachers, on their part, are glad to reward the kids’ keen involvement and commitment: “One of my students had never been outstanding in Greek; however, being good at using computers, he was chosen to play all the games, and to supervise any activity involving the use of technologies. He worked very seriously and accurately. I gave him a good mark to reward his active participation in the project.” Some discipline rules had to be followed during online meetings: no offence was tolerated, and scores were taken from teams for misbehaviour (especially in the chat); students, while cheering for their team, tended to address the opponents with mild insults; when necessary, the guide scolded and punished them; yet, most of the times, it was the students themselves who urged their class mates to be disciplined. Especially in classes with discipline problems, teachers regarded this fact as a huge improvement.

Figure 7: Scenes from the experimental phase 4.3. Learning Methodology There are many ways to organize class activities related to the Experience. Once agreed on few essential guidelines, necessary for coordinating work among different schools, much is left to the creativity and initiative of the teachers. We soon understood that there was a “second-side” of the design of the educational experience, dependent on every single teacher in her/his own specific context: without this passionate and professional work, the SEE experience

would never have worked, no matter how carefully prepared by the staff. Of course, the role of teachers changes also depending on the age of pupils and the kind of school: while fifth-year students of a humanities high school are able to organize themselves quite autonomously, middle school kids need more support and directions from their teacher. On the whole, the project had two basic effects concerning learning methodology. 1. All the students of a class felt as a “team”, understanding that they had to cooperate in order to successfully participate in the experience. 2. Students learnt how to work in groups, autonomously and responsibly (although with the fundamental supervision and support of the teacher). The project has a sort of “team spirit building” effect: putting aside all sorts of jealousy, all the students felt “as one”, knowing that “each one’s skills were resources for the class. They understood that, by playing their role well, the whole team would benefit”; “they stood together, united to win”. In order to better organize their effort, they split into groups, each one taking charge of a specific aspect of the project; they formed ‘experts groups’, that is, groups specialized in a specific part of the content to be studied, sharing their knowledge with the others and answering the cultural questions during the online experience. When doing the homework, they met together after school hours, doing research, interviewing local experts and even working at the teacher’s house, who put his/her library at their disposal: “They live in the same neighbourhood and met in the afternoons to study together, whereas usually they work alone”. Again, teachers’ supervision played a crucial role: “They worked hard, preparing schemas and conceptual maps. We worked on two fronts: knowledge and method; we wanted them to learn not only the contents, but also how to distinguish important information from secondary aspects.” On the whole, they learnt how to effectively collaborate in view of a common goal, and the experience left its mark: “One of my pupils of last year, who now attends a senior high school with two other ex-students of mine, came to see me and told me about her new schoolmates. She said: ‘we had to do some work in groups, and the others are so clumsy! You know, they didn’t do the Scrolls’…”

5. Conclusions Starting from the observation that SEE is very successful from an educational point of view, we asked ourselves two basic questions: • What makes it different from most other e-learning experiences (generally unsuccessful, or mildly successful at best)? • How can we build similar experiences, without loosing the key success factors? A first observation is that SEE is a mixed experience: e-learning activities are interleaved with a lot of “traditional learning”. 3D online technology provides engagement and motivation: most of the learning style remains traditional. A second important factor is the role of teachers: they acted as mediators, coordinators and motivation enforcers. In a sense we convinced teachers first; once persuaded them about the value of the experience, “the job” was done: they “transmitted” their motivations and their enthusiasms to their students. Teachers’ motivation was partly due to the feeling of being, in their own institutions, “the innovators”; a teacher told us, that she was so enthusiastic about the project that her colleagues started calling her “Dead Sea Scrolls”. A third factor has been the fact that students were given high responsibility: their teachers wanted them to do well and win, but they didn’t know about the project much more than their pupils. The experience was new also for the teachers, so they couldn’t provide detailed instructions: in many situations the students had to decide on their own what to do, how to organize themselves (e.g. dividing into small groups, collecting the material for the homework, deciding who had to play the games, answering the questions, etc.). A teacher declared: “Students worked a lot by themselves. They really had the idea that this was their project”. As fourth factor we may say, “the interaction is the content”: interacting in real-time with students residing far away, seeing them as they move around in an evocative virtual setting, playing with them in a videogame-like competition, is engaging, fun, magic, etc. The technical format of the 3D worlds worked very well for attracting students and keeping them involved. The technical solution stirred so much interest that even a Math teacher (whose subject has nothing to do with the Experience’s topics) accepted to coordinate a class. A fifth important factor has been the definition of new roles for the students, within each classroom. The new challenge brought “bench students” (with no particular prominence in their classroom) to become important players, since, for example, they were excellent players in the virtual world. Also, the “smartest” students did cooperate very well with the most technically skilled ones (typically not the best study-wise). These changes created a team-spirit drive, producing a very effective impact on the whole class, and a long lasting benefit, beyond the SEE experience.

Other factors could be detected, and we are also aware that these first conclusions should be confirmed by more data. In order to get a full proven picture, a new “experimental delivery” is going on through Spring 2004, involving a higher proportion of foreign students. We are collecting systematic data with a scientific research methodology, in order to fully understand the effect of this complex learning environment in all its facets. The evident success of SEE has prompted public and private organizations to take notice: a similar experience is being therefore planned for Italy (regional history will be the content) and for Europe (content yet to be defined).

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Acknowledgements We wish to acknowledge the work of all the people (details can be found in www.seequmran.it) who passionately contributed to make the SEE project a successful experience. First of all we thank the curatorial staff of the Israel Museum, which conceived the project, and made it possible (providing strategy, content and seed financing). Then we warmly thank the scientific committee, the editorial staff and the development team of SEE, including the contribution of Sophie s.r.l. A special thank goes to the teachers and students who took part in the experimental phase, and made it very successful.