2 This paper presents further elaboration on the claim that the development of knowledge, skills ... more 2 This paper presents further elaboration on the claim that the development of knowledge, skills and cognitive processes is influenced by the demands and constraints presented by available knowledge technologies. From this perspective, cognitive processes are viewed not just as a basic characteristic of mind, but also as a consequence of the interaction between cognitive structures and cognitive technologies. Knowledge or cognitive technologies may be defined as all the means (either instrumental or methodological) which contribute to the completion and expansion of the natural abilities of the human mind, in processes relating to the handling of knowledge, thinking, learning and solving problems. Between the paintings in the prehistoric caves ' walls, and the feats of virtual reality that are materializing before our very eyes today, lies a rich history of the development of knowledge technologies. In this paper I refer to nine approaches for analyzing and discussing the inter...
Many educational systems worldwide are putting much work in the assimilation of ICT in schools, f... more Many educational systems worldwide are putting much work in the assimilation of ICT in schools, fostering significant changes in the processes of instruction and learning. These changes occur in schools at various levels by means of, e.g., the creation of new learning configurations (beyond traditional time and space configurations), the devise of novel pedagogical solutions, or through the expansion of the school's knowledgeresources space into cyberspace. These transformations, and the processes by which they occur, have become highly interesting research themes with obvious theoretical (e.g., cognitive or curricular issues) as well as practical (e.g., policy or planning issues) implications. We present an analysis schema for the systematic study of these transformational processes in schools using ICT. The schema's dimensions are located within a grid defined by two axes. The horizontal axis represents levels of innovation from preliminary alterations in the school’s ro...
Design and technology education : an international journal, 2020
Despite the fact that the sophisticated technologies are a substantial component of children’s ev... more Despite the fact that the sophisticated technologies are a substantial component of children’s everyday environment, of the space within which they act, play and learn the world of complex technological systems (their characteristics, and the knowledge and skills involved in operating, designing and programming them) is almost ignored in the preschool and elementary school curriculum. The study reported in this paper is part of a research plan embedded in the implementation of a comprehensive curriculum aiming to support the development of technological thinking in kindergartens, including knowledge and skills in areas such as design, the artifacts in our material culture, smart artifacts and robotic systems, or programming. This particular study aimed to address young children’s (aged 5-8) perception of the adaptive behavior of a robot and the representational structures (or functioning schemes) they adopt to think about how its behaviors are generated and controlled. When children...
by-Modeling (LbM). Studying complex systems is increasingly important in teaching and learning ma... more by-Modeling (LbM). Studying complex systems is increasingly important in teaching and learning many science domains. Many features of complex systems make it difficult for students to develop deep understanding. Previous research indicates that involvement with modeling scientific phenomena and complex systems can play a powerful role in science learning. Some researchers argue with this view indicating that models and modeling do not contribute to understanding complexity concepts, since these increases the cognitive load on students. This study will investigate the effect of different modes of involvement in exploring scientific phenomena using computer simulation tools, on students' mental model from the perspective of structure, behavior and function. Quantitative and qualitative methods are used to report about 121 freshmen students that engaged in participatory simulations about complex phenomena, showing emergent, self-organized and decentralized patterns. Results show th...
Proceedings of the 2017 Conference on Interaction Design and Children, 2017
Over the past 50 years, since the introduction of the programmable floor turtle, the dyad learnin... more Over the past 50 years, since the introduction of the programmable floor turtle, the dyad learning /programming environment underwent several transformations. Each transformation brought about new questions regarding children's understanding, learning and programming performance. This paper describes results from a preliminary study analyzing the current transformation from desktop to mobile-based learning/programming by kindergarten children. Observations of children's performance and semi structured interviews with teachers were conducted. The findings unveiled three key themes, namely, changes in programmers' perspectives, changes in foci and learning patterns in different programming modes, and changes in patterns of collaboration among peers. The preliminary findings serve as basis for planning further systematic research on the design of mobile-based programming environments for kindergarten children.
This paper reports about the first stage of implementation of an innovative curriculum on technol... more This paper reports about the first stage of implementation of an innovative curriculum on technological thinking and doing in the kindergarten. The main goal in this first stage was to train the teaching teams, supporting their learning of the rationale, contents and pedagogical resources of the new curricular program. The program is the result of four years of research and development in an experimental project conducted in kindergartens in center Israel, and is currently being implemented in three kindergartens in north Israel in a cooperative effort between Tel-Aviv University and World ORT a world non-governmental organization supporting technology education and vocational training in Israel and countries worldwide. The challenge in this training effort is to foster the introduction of an innovative program influencing multiple aspects of the kindergartens’ life: it is about technology (content), technological thinking (cognitive processes and skills), technology teaching in the...
The phenomenon of control is an essential component of our everyday natural, social, and artifici... more The phenomenon of control is an essential component of our everyday natural, social, and artificial environment. Control-related concepts have become a central component of many core topics in modern technology education. Our knowledge about students’ abilities to understand (analysis) and design (synthesis) controlled systems, however, is stili poor. Evidence already collected shows that students have serious difficulties in transcending the phenomenal or behavioral understanding of a system’s functioning toward more formal definitions of the control process. In this paper a framework to start dealing with these and related issues is proposed. First, the nature of controlled systems is discussed. Then a conceptual framework encompassing a variety of perspectives on and approaches to control is presented. The framework consists of two main components: the process component and the representational component. The first relates to the stages in the process of defining and implementing...
This paper describes part of a project about Learningby- Modeling (LbM). Studying complex systems... more This paper describes part of a project about Learningby- Modeling (LbM). Studying complex systems is increasingly important in teaching and learning many science domains. Many features of complex systems make it difficult for students to develop deep understanding. Previous research indicates that involvement with modeling scientific phenomena and complex systems can play a powerful role in science learning. Some researchers argue with this view indicating that models and modeling do not contribute to understanding complexity concepts, since these increases the cognitive load on students. This study will investigate the effect of different modes of involvement in exploring scientific phenomena using computer simulation tools, on students- mental model from the perspective of structure, behavior and function. Quantitative and qualitative methods are used to report about 121 freshmen students that engaged in participatory simulations about complex phenomena, showing emergent, self-org...
Human Technology is an interdisciplinary, scholarly journal that presents innovative, peer-review... more Human Technology is an interdisciplinary, scholarly journal that presents innovative, peer-reviewed articles exploring the issues and challenges surrounding human-technology interaction and the human role in all areas of our ICT-infused societies. Human Technology is published by the Agora Center, University of Jyväskylä and distributed without a charge online.
The effect of alternative approaches to design instruction (structural or functional) on students... more The effect of alternative approaches to design instruction (structural or functional) on students’ mental models of technological design processes
The contribution of Project-based-learning to high-achievers ’ acquisition of technological knowl... more The contribution of Project-based-learning to high-achievers ’ acquisition of technological knowledge and skills
Abstract—Understanding the behavior of complex systems has become a focal issue for scientists in... more Abstract—Understanding the behavior of complex systems has become a focal issue for scientists in a wide range of disciplines. Making sense of a complex system should require that a student construct a network of concepts and principles about the learning complex phenomena. This paper describes part of a project about Learning-by-Modeling (LbM). Many features of complex systems make it difficult for students to develop deep understanding. Previous research indicates that involvement with modeling scientific phenomena and complex systems can play a powerful role in science learning. Some researchers argue with this view indicating that models and modeling do not contribute to understanding complexity concepts, since these increases the cognitive load on students. In this study we investigated the effect of different modes of involvement in exploring scientific phenomena using computer simulation tools, on students ’ mental model from the perspective of structure, behaviour and functi...
Abstract. This paper describes a pedagogical approach aiming to support students ' understan... more Abstract. This paper describes a pedagogical approach aiming to support students ' understanding of the structural and behavioural features of complex systems. The pedagogical approach is based on the gradual progression from concept mapping to conceptual modelling of systems. Studies conducted aimed to unveil students ' conceptual understanding and development of a systems worldview. Instruments and scoring guides were developed for analysing both concepts maps and qualitative computermodels constructed by the students. Results show that the integrated approach supported junior-high-school students' understanding of the structural as well as the dynamic features of systems, and their ability to explore system behaviours under changing conditions. 1
Modeling is regarded as fundamental to human cog-nition and scientific inquiry (Schwarz and White... more Modeling is regarded as fundamental to human cog-nition and scientific inquiry (Schwarz and White2005). It helps learners express and externalize their thinking, visualize and test components of their theories, and make materials more interesting. Particularly, the impor-tance of learners constructing conceptual interpretations of system behavior has been pointed out many times (Mettes and Roossink [1981], Elio and Sharf [1990], Ploetzner and Spada [1998], Frederiksen and White [2002]). Modeling envi-ronments can thus make a significant contribution to the improvement of science education. A new class of knowledge construction tools is emerging that uses logic-based (symbolic, nonnumeric) representations for expressing conceptual systems knowledge (Forbus et al. 2005, Leelawong and Biswas 2008, Bredeweg et al. 2009). Dif-ferent from the numeric-based tools (Richmond and Peter-son 1992, Pratap 2009), these tools employ a qualitative vocabulary (Forbus 2008) for users to construct the...
This study examines the extent and characteristics of ICT usage among 384 junior high and high sc... more This study examines the extent and characteristics of ICT usage among 384 junior high and high school students in Israel. Its focus is on (a) the purpose and patterns of ICT usage, with focus on the Internet, by 12-18-year-old youngsters; (b) gender and age differences in ICT use; (c) the linkage between ICT usage and school activities; and (d) the students’ perception of their own ICT level of knowledge. The findings show that ICT is being used by 90% of the research population, and the Internet by about 50% of the students. The main purpose for ICT use is for computer games and word processing, and far behind spreadsheet, programming and information retrieval. Minor linkage was found between the Internet usage and school related tasks. The results showed significant gender differences in most aspects. In general, more boys used ICT more extensively than girls did. Differences among age groups were found mainly with respect to the use of complex applications, but not Internet use p...
Interdisciplinary Journal of e-Skills and Lifelong Learning, 2012
A qualitative model of a system is an abstraction that captures ordinal knowledge and predicts th... more A qualitative model of a system is an abstraction that captures ordinal knowledge and predicts the set of qualitatively possible behaviours of the system, given a qualitative description of its structure and initial state. This paper examines an innovative approach to science education using an interactive learning environment that supports learners in expressing and simulating conceptual knowledge by building qualitative models in ecology. The learning environment and tools are being developed as part of the Dynalearn qualitative modeling research project, funded by the European Union's 7th framework programme and carried out by a consortium of eight participant universities. In summing up the results, it is clear that from the perspective of systems thinking, the modeling activity affected students' perception of systems making them able to represent it in a more dynamic and comprehensive way.
This article attempts to investigate the social and educational potential of the Multi User Dimen... more This article attempts to investigate the social and educational potential of the Multi User Dimension Object Oriented (MOO) environment, with emphasis on the educational MOO. This is accomplished through a close examination of the profile of MOO users. One hundred sixty one MOO users of both social and educational MOO environments completed an anonymous online survey on their MOO experience which examined their demographic characteristics, motivation for frequenting the MOO, use of the MOO, perception of the MOO, and the way they viewed their membership there. Findings regarding the demographic characteristics of users are consistent with the literature. Respondents were mainly native English speakers, computer competent, and had a high level of education. They grasp the environment as both social and educational and used it mainly for sharing ideas and professional tips. The elements found favored by most users were the sense of community and the intercultural contact. A typologica...
This is a conference paper The study reported here is a research project aimed to examine the rel... more This is a conference paper The study reported here is a research project aimed to examine the relationship between alternative approaches towards design teaching (structural or functional), and the students’ mental modelling of the design process and the quality of their design process. The structural approach emphasizes the need for an ordered learning of the stages of the design process, while the functional approach emphasizes the teaching and study of design functions (rather than stages). 80 seventh graders, divided in two groups, were taught a unit on technological problem solving by either approach for fourteen classes (21 hours). Before, during and after the design process of a technological solution the students had to generate representations of this process and make portfolios representing their problem solving process. The results were analysed looking for: (a) The differences between the groups in the mental models which were constructed during the instruction process. ...
This study focuses on handheld computer as e-book in education. The study objectives are as follo... more This study focuses on handheld computer as e-book in education. The study objectives are as follows: To find out what students think about learning that integrates e-books in an academic course, and to compare reading strategy in the e-book and the printed book. The study findings support integrating handheld computer as e-book in learning.
International Journal of Information and Education Technology, 2012
This paper describes part of a study about Learning-by-Modeling (LbM). Previous research indicate... more This paper describes part of a study about Learning-by-Modeling (LbM). Previous research indicates that involvement with modeling scientific phenomena and complex systems can play a powerful role in science learning. Some researchers argue with this view indicating that models and modeling do not contribute to understanding complexity concepts, since these increases the cognitive load on students. This study will investigate the effect of different modes of involvement in exploring scientific phenomena using computer agent modeling tools, on students' understanding of complexity concepts. Quantitative and qualitative methods are used to report about 121 freshmen students that engaged in participatory simulations about complex phenomena, showing emergent, self organized and decentralized patterns. Results show that LbM plays a major role in students' concept formation about complexity concepts.
2 This paper presents further elaboration on the claim that the development of knowledge, skills ... more 2 This paper presents further elaboration on the claim that the development of knowledge, skills and cognitive processes is influenced by the demands and constraints presented by available knowledge technologies. From this perspective, cognitive processes are viewed not just as a basic characteristic of mind, but also as a consequence of the interaction between cognitive structures and cognitive technologies. Knowledge or cognitive technologies may be defined as all the means (either instrumental or methodological) which contribute to the completion and expansion of the natural abilities of the human mind, in processes relating to the handling of knowledge, thinking, learning and solving problems. Between the paintings in the prehistoric caves ' walls, and the feats of virtual reality that are materializing before our very eyes today, lies a rich history of the development of knowledge technologies. In this paper I refer to nine approaches for analyzing and discussing the inter...
Many educational systems worldwide are putting much work in the assimilation of ICT in schools, f... more Many educational systems worldwide are putting much work in the assimilation of ICT in schools, fostering significant changes in the processes of instruction and learning. These changes occur in schools at various levels by means of, e.g., the creation of new learning configurations (beyond traditional time and space configurations), the devise of novel pedagogical solutions, or through the expansion of the school's knowledgeresources space into cyberspace. These transformations, and the processes by which they occur, have become highly interesting research themes with obvious theoretical (e.g., cognitive or curricular issues) as well as practical (e.g., policy or planning issues) implications. We present an analysis schema for the systematic study of these transformational processes in schools using ICT. The schema's dimensions are located within a grid defined by two axes. The horizontal axis represents levels of innovation from preliminary alterations in the school’s ro...
Design and technology education : an international journal, 2020
Despite the fact that the sophisticated technologies are a substantial component of children’s ev... more Despite the fact that the sophisticated technologies are a substantial component of children’s everyday environment, of the space within which they act, play and learn the world of complex technological systems (their characteristics, and the knowledge and skills involved in operating, designing and programming them) is almost ignored in the preschool and elementary school curriculum. The study reported in this paper is part of a research plan embedded in the implementation of a comprehensive curriculum aiming to support the development of technological thinking in kindergartens, including knowledge and skills in areas such as design, the artifacts in our material culture, smart artifacts and robotic systems, or programming. This particular study aimed to address young children’s (aged 5-8) perception of the adaptive behavior of a robot and the representational structures (or functioning schemes) they adopt to think about how its behaviors are generated and controlled. When children...
by-Modeling (LbM). Studying complex systems is increasingly important in teaching and learning ma... more by-Modeling (LbM). Studying complex systems is increasingly important in teaching and learning many science domains. Many features of complex systems make it difficult for students to develop deep understanding. Previous research indicates that involvement with modeling scientific phenomena and complex systems can play a powerful role in science learning. Some researchers argue with this view indicating that models and modeling do not contribute to understanding complexity concepts, since these increases the cognitive load on students. This study will investigate the effect of different modes of involvement in exploring scientific phenomena using computer simulation tools, on students' mental model from the perspective of structure, behavior and function. Quantitative and qualitative methods are used to report about 121 freshmen students that engaged in participatory simulations about complex phenomena, showing emergent, self-organized and decentralized patterns. Results show th...
Proceedings of the 2017 Conference on Interaction Design and Children, 2017
Over the past 50 years, since the introduction of the programmable floor turtle, the dyad learnin... more Over the past 50 years, since the introduction of the programmable floor turtle, the dyad learning /programming environment underwent several transformations. Each transformation brought about new questions regarding children's understanding, learning and programming performance. This paper describes results from a preliminary study analyzing the current transformation from desktop to mobile-based learning/programming by kindergarten children. Observations of children's performance and semi structured interviews with teachers were conducted. The findings unveiled three key themes, namely, changes in programmers' perspectives, changes in foci and learning patterns in different programming modes, and changes in patterns of collaboration among peers. The preliminary findings serve as basis for planning further systematic research on the design of mobile-based programming environments for kindergarten children.
This paper reports about the first stage of implementation of an innovative curriculum on technol... more This paper reports about the first stage of implementation of an innovative curriculum on technological thinking and doing in the kindergarten. The main goal in this first stage was to train the teaching teams, supporting their learning of the rationale, contents and pedagogical resources of the new curricular program. The program is the result of four years of research and development in an experimental project conducted in kindergartens in center Israel, and is currently being implemented in three kindergartens in north Israel in a cooperative effort between Tel-Aviv University and World ORT a world non-governmental organization supporting technology education and vocational training in Israel and countries worldwide. The challenge in this training effort is to foster the introduction of an innovative program influencing multiple aspects of the kindergartens’ life: it is about technology (content), technological thinking (cognitive processes and skills), technology teaching in the...
The phenomenon of control is an essential component of our everyday natural, social, and artifici... more The phenomenon of control is an essential component of our everyday natural, social, and artificial environment. Control-related concepts have become a central component of many core topics in modern technology education. Our knowledge about students’ abilities to understand (analysis) and design (synthesis) controlled systems, however, is stili poor. Evidence already collected shows that students have serious difficulties in transcending the phenomenal or behavioral understanding of a system’s functioning toward more formal definitions of the control process. In this paper a framework to start dealing with these and related issues is proposed. First, the nature of controlled systems is discussed. Then a conceptual framework encompassing a variety of perspectives on and approaches to control is presented. The framework consists of two main components: the process component and the representational component. The first relates to the stages in the process of defining and implementing...
This paper describes part of a project about Learningby- Modeling (LbM). Studying complex systems... more This paper describes part of a project about Learningby- Modeling (LbM). Studying complex systems is increasingly important in teaching and learning many science domains. Many features of complex systems make it difficult for students to develop deep understanding. Previous research indicates that involvement with modeling scientific phenomena and complex systems can play a powerful role in science learning. Some researchers argue with this view indicating that models and modeling do not contribute to understanding complexity concepts, since these increases the cognitive load on students. This study will investigate the effect of different modes of involvement in exploring scientific phenomena using computer simulation tools, on students- mental model from the perspective of structure, behavior and function. Quantitative and qualitative methods are used to report about 121 freshmen students that engaged in participatory simulations about complex phenomena, showing emergent, self-org...
Human Technology is an interdisciplinary, scholarly journal that presents innovative, peer-review... more Human Technology is an interdisciplinary, scholarly journal that presents innovative, peer-reviewed articles exploring the issues and challenges surrounding human-technology interaction and the human role in all areas of our ICT-infused societies. Human Technology is published by the Agora Center, University of Jyväskylä and distributed without a charge online.
The effect of alternative approaches to design instruction (structural or functional) on students... more The effect of alternative approaches to design instruction (structural or functional) on students’ mental models of technological design processes
The contribution of Project-based-learning to high-achievers ’ acquisition of technological knowl... more The contribution of Project-based-learning to high-achievers ’ acquisition of technological knowledge and skills
Abstract—Understanding the behavior of complex systems has become a focal issue for scientists in... more Abstract—Understanding the behavior of complex systems has become a focal issue for scientists in a wide range of disciplines. Making sense of a complex system should require that a student construct a network of concepts and principles about the learning complex phenomena. This paper describes part of a project about Learning-by-Modeling (LbM). Many features of complex systems make it difficult for students to develop deep understanding. Previous research indicates that involvement with modeling scientific phenomena and complex systems can play a powerful role in science learning. Some researchers argue with this view indicating that models and modeling do not contribute to understanding complexity concepts, since these increases the cognitive load on students. In this study we investigated the effect of different modes of involvement in exploring scientific phenomena using computer simulation tools, on students ’ mental model from the perspective of structure, behaviour and functi...
Abstract. This paper describes a pedagogical approach aiming to support students ' understan... more Abstract. This paper describes a pedagogical approach aiming to support students ' understanding of the structural and behavioural features of complex systems. The pedagogical approach is based on the gradual progression from concept mapping to conceptual modelling of systems. Studies conducted aimed to unveil students ' conceptual understanding and development of a systems worldview. Instruments and scoring guides were developed for analysing both concepts maps and qualitative computermodels constructed by the students. Results show that the integrated approach supported junior-high-school students' understanding of the structural as well as the dynamic features of systems, and their ability to explore system behaviours under changing conditions. 1
Modeling is regarded as fundamental to human cog-nition and scientific inquiry (Schwarz and White... more Modeling is regarded as fundamental to human cog-nition and scientific inquiry (Schwarz and White2005). It helps learners express and externalize their thinking, visualize and test components of their theories, and make materials more interesting. Particularly, the impor-tance of learners constructing conceptual interpretations of system behavior has been pointed out many times (Mettes and Roossink [1981], Elio and Sharf [1990], Ploetzner and Spada [1998], Frederiksen and White [2002]). Modeling envi-ronments can thus make a significant contribution to the improvement of science education. A new class of knowledge construction tools is emerging that uses logic-based (symbolic, nonnumeric) representations for expressing conceptual systems knowledge (Forbus et al. 2005, Leelawong and Biswas 2008, Bredeweg et al. 2009). Dif-ferent from the numeric-based tools (Richmond and Peter-son 1992, Pratap 2009), these tools employ a qualitative vocabulary (Forbus 2008) for users to construct the...
This study examines the extent and characteristics of ICT usage among 384 junior high and high sc... more This study examines the extent and characteristics of ICT usage among 384 junior high and high school students in Israel. Its focus is on (a) the purpose and patterns of ICT usage, with focus on the Internet, by 12-18-year-old youngsters; (b) gender and age differences in ICT use; (c) the linkage between ICT usage and school activities; and (d) the students’ perception of their own ICT level of knowledge. The findings show that ICT is being used by 90% of the research population, and the Internet by about 50% of the students. The main purpose for ICT use is for computer games and word processing, and far behind spreadsheet, programming and information retrieval. Minor linkage was found between the Internet usage and school related tasks. The results showed significant gender differences in most aspects. In general, more boys used ICT more extensively than girls did. Differences among age groups were found mainly with respect to the use of complex applications, but not Internet use p...
Interdisciplinary Journal of e-Skills and Lifelong Learning, 2012
A qualitative model of a system is an abstraction that captures ordinal knowledge and predicts th... more A qualitative model of a system is an abstraction that captures ordinal knowledge and predicts the set of qualitatively possible behaviours of the system, given a qualitative description of its structure and initial state. This paper examines an innovative approach to science education using an interactive learning environment that supports learners in expressing and simulating conceptual knowledge by building qualitative models in ecology. The learning environment and tools are being developed as part of the Dynalearn qualitative modeling research project, funded by the European Union's 7th framework programme and carried out by a consortium of eight participant universities. In summing up the results, it is clear that from the perspective of systems thinking, the modeling activity affected students' perception of systems making them able to represent it in a more dynamic and comprehensive way.
This article attempts to investigate the social and educational potential of the Multi User Dimen... more This article attempts to investigate the social and educational potential of the Multi User Dimension Object Oriented (MOO) environment, with emphasis on the educational MOO. This is accomplished through a close examination of the profile of MOO users. One hundred sixty one MOO users of both social and educational MOO environments completed an anonymous online survey on their MOO experience which examined their demographic characteristics, motivation for frequenting the MOO, use of the MOO, perception of the MOO, and the way they viewed their membership there. Findings regarding the demographic characteristics of users are consistent with the literature. Respondents were mainly native English speakers, computer competent, and had a high level of education. They grasp the environment as both social and educational and used it mainly for sharing ideas and professional tips. The elements found favored by most users were the sense of community and the intercultural contact. A typologica...
This is a conference paper The study reported here is a research project aimed to examine the rel... more This is a conference paper The study reported here is a research project aimed to examine the relationship between alternative approaches towards design teaching (structural or functional), and the students’ mental modelling of the design process and the quality of their design process. The structural approach emphasizes the need for an ordered learning of the stages of the design process, while the functional approach emphasizes the teaching and study of design functions (rather than stages). 80 seventh graders, divided in two groups, were taught a unit on technological problem solving by either approach for fourteen classes (21 hours). Before, during and after the design process of a technological solution the students had to generate representations of this process and make portfolios representing their problem solving process. The results were analysed looking for: (a) The differences between the groups in the mental models which were constructed during the instruction process. ...
This study focuses on handheld computer as e-book in education. The study objectives are as follo... more This study focuses on handheld computer as e-book in education. The study objectives are as follows: To find out what students think about learning that integrates e-books in an academic course, and to compare reading strategy in the e-book and the printed book. The study findings support integrating handheld computer as e-book in learning.
International Journal of Information and Education Technology, 2012
This paper describes part of a study about Learning-by-Modeling (LbM). Previous research indicate... more This paper describes part of a study about Learning-by-Modeling (LbM). Previous research indicates that involvement with modeling scientific phenomena and complex systems can play a powerful role in science learning. Some researchers argue with this view indicating that models and modeling do not contribute to understanding complexity concepts, since these increases the cognitive load on students. This study will investigate the effect of different modes of involvement in exploring scientific phenomena using computer agent modeling tools, on students' understanding of complexity concepts. Quantitative and qualitative methods are used to report about 121 freshmen students that engaged in participatory simulations about complex phenomena, showing emergent, self organized and decentralized patterns. Results show that LbM plays a major role in students' concept formation about complexity concepts.
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Papers by David Mioduser