Learning Spaces: Interactives, Widgets, & Games for Learning
Interaction occurs when two or more objects have an effect upon each other. In virtual learning spaces, this interaction often occurs between the human and the computer. When people design learning spaces for this type of computer-based interaction, they're sometimes called interactives.
In an article titled Online Storytelling Forms, Johnathan Dubein suggests that people "use print to explain. Use multimedia to show. Use interactives to demonstrate and engage."
Most commonly these interactives are designed in software such as Flash that combines, text, graphics, audio, video, and animation with interactive elements such as buttons, drag/drop, and media controls.
Read Flash: Engaging Learners Through Animation, Interaction, and Multimedia by Annette Lamb and Larry Johnson in Teacher Librarian (April 2006, (33)4, 54-56.
Interactives
An increasing number of groups are creating free interactives. For instance The Concord Consortium are designing free, interactive science software. These interactives combine tools with problem-solving activities. Try the Broken Calculator. In this interactive, users are asked to solve problems with keys on the calculator are broken.
Go to Flash: Exploration. Browse through the online simulation and games.
Explore examples of interactivity including Approximating Pi, Destination: Modern Art, Dogs Around the World, WickED Interactives, MyPyramid, Pauly Playhouse, and Nobel Prize. What different types of interactivity can you identify?
Explore how tools are incorporated into Flash projects.
Artist's Toolkit
Build Your Own Snowboard
Create a Sculpture
Design a Parachute
The Drake Equation
Forces Lab
Let's Make a Microbe
Loads Lab
Infinite Secrets: Pi
Making Vaccines
Materials Lab
Read Write Think Student Materials
Room Planner
Thumb Piano Tunes
Invention at Play: Cloud Dreamer, Puzzle Blocks, Tinker Ball, Word Play
Related Tools
Not all interactives use Flash technology. For example, NoodleQuest is a tool to help users do academic research. Through a series of questions, users are provided with some good places to start their exploration.
Check out some of these other related tools:
Interactives can serve many purposes. In Interactive Visual Explainers-A Simple Classification from elearningpost, Maish Nichani and Venkat Rajamanickam explain that interactives "are brief Web-based interactive visual explainers. They are designed to explain complex concepts or ideas. Of late, they are usually created in Macromedia Flash or Macromedia Director. Since the practice is new, different names are used to describe it -- "Flash Infographics", "Motion Graphics", and "Interaction Graphics" are some we've come across. We like "Interactives" because it embodies interaction--the building block of the Web--and thus does not bring across any preconceived notions from the print world."
Nichani and Rajamanickam have identified four types of interactives and examples:
- Narrative that give the reader a vicarious experiemce through a story. Examples: Enron 101,
- Instructives that take a reader sequentially through an explanation. Examples: Birth of a Tornado,
- Exploratives that give the reader a chance to discover information themselves. Examples: Becoming Human, India-Pakistan Rivalry
- Simulatives that emulate real-world experiences. Examples: What is Print?, Baggage Screening, Sailing
Widgets
Widgets (sometimes known as gadgets) are self-contained, mini-applications. These mini apps can be downloaded and run on your desktop or embedded on your web page. If you maintain a blog or participate in a social network, you've probably seen widgets at work displaying the current weather, showing a world map of users, or offering a game of Suduko. Particularly popular in Facebook, widgets can easily be placed in any web page.
There are many ways to use widgets. For instance, you might add the LibraryThing widget shown the the right. This widget shows books for children from my LibraryThing library.
There are many sources of widgets. If you find a widget you like, look for a link to the developer's website. They will generally describe the terms of use and provide the code. You can also find lists of widgets on popular websites such as Yahoo. To use a widget, look for the HTML code that has been provided with the mini app. This code can be copied and pasted in your website, blog, or social network. If you're a YouTube user, you've probably seen this code before. Keep in mind that you can also embedd TeacherTube videos. Keep in mind that some widgets are associated with particular websites or software applications. For instance, you may not be able to use a Facebook widget in another website. Lists of Widgets
If you can't find the widget you seek, try doing a web search for a topic and add the word widget such as "weather widget". Widget Development ToolsThere are a number of services that let you create your own widget. Just follow the directions, then embed the code provided.
Learn more at Widget Engine or Widget Toolkit from Wikipedia. |
Interactives and Widgets in Learning
Interactives are a wonderful way to engage learners of all ages. Look for interactives to support content that is difficult to teach using traditional methods.
Read Engaging Interactives for eLearning: 25 Ways Awake and Intrigued (PDF) by B.J. Schone (a contributing author of eLearningWeekly.com and co-creator of eLearningPulse.com). Then go to Engaging Interactives for Elearning blog to see lots of other examples.
There are many different types of interactives. Rather than using them in isolation, look for on- and off- computer connections to extend the experience. Go to Tale of the Fairytale to see an example of combining an interactive with other classroom and library ideas.
Use the following resources to explore the spectrum of possibilities.
The Myths is a website that explores world creation mythology. Each interactive includes an overview of the culture, the pantheon of the gods and a series of exercises based on that culture.
An educator might use this website along with other websites on mythology such as 42explore: Mythology and Encyclopedia Mythica.
Television programs like CSI have spurred interest in forensic science. Read Stiff : The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach. The BBC Interactive Body provides users with experiences exploring different aspects of the human body through games. A variety of techniques are applied including puzzles, matching pages, questions, and demonstrations. The Autoposy Interactive from HBO contains three different interactive elements related to forensic science. First, try your hand at conducting an autoposy using the Interactive Autopsy. Second, explore the Interactive Casebook to examine crime scene materials. Third, explore a timeline. Go to a pathfinder for other ideas.
The Build a Habitat and Build a Panda Habitat interactives are examples of tools for building. There are many of these types of "creator" interactive. Look for ways to connect to off-computer activities. For instance, children might read fiction or nonfiction books about the ocean, use the interactive, then write a fiction story containing facts. Create a display containing books, a laptop, and a bulletin board of student-generated stories and projects.
Books might include Sand, Leaf, or Coral Reef: A Book about Animal Habitats by Patricia M. Stockland; I See a Kookaburra!: Discovering Animal Habitats around the World by Steve Jenkins and Robin Page; All Kinds of Habitats by Sally Hewitt, Crinkleroot’s Guide to Knowing: Animal Habitats by Jim Arnosky, Kids’ Easy-to-Create Wildlife Habitats by Emily Stetson, and My Very First Book of Animal Homes by Eric Carle.
Include websites such as 42explore: Animal Homes, Enhanced Learning Biomes, National Geographic Habitats, Ocean Habitats, and ThinkQuest Habitats.
Explore the following examples of how interactives can be used in learning
Interactives in Learning and Libraries
There are many ways that interactives can be integrated into library programs, promotions, and displays.
Book Cover Promotion. According to Leigh Ann Jones in her article "The Great Cover-Up" in School Library Journal, people do judge a book by its cover. She found that middle school students use book cover art as their main reason for selecting a book. Below are two covers from the award-winning book Birdwing by Rafe Martin. Which would you choose?
Some books in your library have old, unattractive covers. Get young people involved with creating book covers. Use the ReadWriteThink Book Cover Creator interactive to get patrons involved in designing and creating innovative book covers. Ask people to create graphics that capture the theme of the book.
Extreme Makeover Promotion. Get out your interior design, Feng Shui, architecture, and other design books and have some fun. Set up a display with books related to room planning and design, add a laptop with one of the many room planner interactives (Jordan's Furniture Room Planner, Dulux), set up a television with your HGTV DVDs, create a pathfinder with websites and have some fun. Set up a bulletin board to share favorite designs. Invite a local interior designer to speak to the group.
Music Promotion. Create a display of instruments, books, how-to videos, and instrumental audio CDs. Incorporate a laptop into the display for people to try out online instruments such as the PBS thumbpiano page. Go to the Thumbpiano wiki for other ideas. Check out the Guitar (PDF) brochure for an example of how you could incorporate the Guitar interactive into your display.
Dinosaur Days Promotion. Get young people excited about exploring dinosaurs. Use the Dinosphere website from the Indianapolis Children's Museum as the focus of a learning center in your children's section. Go to the Learn About Dinosaurs! page for lots of ideas and examples.
Underground Railroad Learning Station. Build an interactive display incorporating picture books, chapter books, primary source documents, videos, and interactive activities. Interactives might include Pathways to Freedom and Headbone's Escape to Freedom, Go to Learning the RUN way for examples that incorporate all these elements.
Connectivity
Digital interaction and collaboration can take place in many learning spaces. For example, many electronic keyboards and other handheld devices have infra-red or bluetooth technology allowing easy information sharing.
Infrared allows devices in close proximity to communicate. Many handheld simulations and interactive games involve this type of sharing.
Bluetooth technology allows devices to connect through wireless personal area networks. For example your keyboard, mouse, printers, and digital cameras could all communicate with your computer through a personal area network. For example, it's common for a smart phone user to share information from their address book with another person running the Palm OS system.
To learn more about handhelds, explore Discover Handhelds by Annette Lamb. Many of these activities involve interactions. If you've never used infrared or bluetooth technology find a friend or visit a store and see how it works.
Games for Learning
Game-based learning is gaining in popularity. The area of Serious Games (SGs) combines entertainment with instruction and training. For example, gaming that involves simulation often feel like play, but contain powerful learning experiences based on real-world situations and consequences.
Visit the PDA Participatory Simulations project at MIT. Browse their games. Look for the social, collaborative, participatory, and interactive aspects of the projects.
Read Teaching Science for Understanding: The Research Behind Science Court™ (PDF) by Tom Snyder Production.
Read Proof of Learning: Assessment in Serious Games from Gamasutra.
Listen to Games for Learning: What Can I Use? or read the PDF by John Galto.
There are many examples of the connection between learning and gaming. For example, Interactive Fiction (IF) is simulation software designed that allows learners to practice composition skills while creating characters and building communities. Tools such as Inform can be used to create this type of interactive fiction.
Go to Marc Prensky for lots of article on this topic.
Many websites contain interactive games. Check out examples at National Geographic games.
Learn More
Gameology: News, Commentary and Resources for the Game Studies Community
Prensky, Marc. Don't Bother Me Mom -- I'm Learning: How Computer and Video Games Are Preparing Your Kids For Twenty-first Century Success -- and How You Can Help!
Prensky, Marc. Digital Game-based Learning.
Simulation & Games for Education - links
Murray, Janet (1997). Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace. MIT Press.
Interactive Resources
- Colonial Williamsburg Interactives
- Uptoten - games for young learners
- Virtual Classroom: Roles of Water
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