Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
increases the amount of oxygen). Based on this concept map, Betty can then answer
questions or fail to be able to answer them, and she can be compared with other
agents who were provided knowledge through concept maps by other students using
a TV quiz-show-like virtual world. The research with TAs shows that students learn
more this way than with other instructional methods—including just doing concept
maps without the agent cover story. There is even a “protégé effect” (Chase, Chin,
Oppezzo, & Schwartz, 2009) where the students will work harder to try to give their
agent good concept map knowledge than they will to prepare themselves for the
quiz show (i.e., they want their agent “protégé” to perform well).
In the REAL Business project (there are different versions of REAL for different
content areas) shown in Fig. 3.3, the students learn some simple statistics by using
procedural networks to specify what an agent running an ice cream shop knows that
will enable him to order the right amount of each ice cream flavor based on prior
experiences with customer agents that flow through the ice cream shop (doing well
involves knowing about statistical sampling). REAL Planet is another version of
REAL that involves ecological knowledge similar to the TA project, although in the
REAL case the agents move through the virtual world and interact with it. REAL
does not yet have any research results on student learning and understanding, but
its research results seem likely to be similar to the TA results. In both the TA and
REAL projects, student learning and understanding is increased by being able to
embody their understanding in animated agents (their “protégés”) in virtual worlds
and then try out and revise their knowledge based on their agents' performances in
the virtual world.
Recently Fadjo and colleagues (Fadjo, Hallman, Harris, & Black, 2009) have
been exploring using the simpler
Scratch
programming language from the MIT
Fig. 3.3
REAL (reflective agent learning environment) business involving specifying decision
procedures for Manager Agent to order ice cream for customer agents
