Interactive Learning Environments:
Where They've Come From & Where They're Going
Elliot Soloway
University of Michigan
1101 Beal Ave.
Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
E-mail: soloway@umich.edu
ABSTRACT
A historical survey of the various teaching and training technologies
will be given. The architectures of computer-assisted instruction
(CAI) systems, simulations, intelligent tutoring systems (ITS),
microworlds, and interactive learning environments (ILE) will
be described. In addition, the types of learning outcomes that
can be expected from the various technologies will also be summarized.
Emphasis will be placed on how the 90's computing infrastructure
(e.g., high-MIP/GIP computation, high- bandwidth networks) will
impact teaching and training, e.g., what is the role of multimedia,
computer-aided design systems, ubiquitous access to information,
the home information appliance, in learning? What will the
impact be as we transition from User-Centered Design to Learner-Centered
Design? Case studies from real instructional systems will be
used to illustrate the main points in the tutorial.
KEYWORDS:
Education & Computers, Interactive Learning Environments,
Intelligent Tutoring Systems, Constructionism
OVERVIEW
From the earliest days of the invention of the computer, there
has been a promise that they would play a major role in education,
from helping children to learn in the school and in the home,
to helping adults acquire job training. Frankly, to date that
potential has not been realized. By and large the impact of
computers on education has been minimal. It is interesting to
examine the reasons why this is so:
- Limited computational power: Up until very recently, the horsepower
available to the user has been minimal: while timesharing and
early desktop machines made computing available on a large scale,
it is only in the last 2-3 years that computing has become available
on a truly significant scale. For example, it is estimated that
there are approximately 33 million personal computers in the
U.S. alone. Moreover, the new generation of chips (Intel Pentium,
Motorola PowerPC) offer considerable horsepower.
- Limited models of learning and teaching: Up until recently,
the dominant theory of education focused on learning as knowledge
transmission; technology was thus used as a method to deliver
information (Skinner, 1958). For example, computer-assisted instruction
packages employed, for the most part, a drill-and-practice methodology
of instruction.
This limited instructional model matched, however, the limited
computational resources available. In contrast, open-ended teaching
and learning strategies that are becoming more popular now (Gardner,
1991; Papert, 1993; Collins, Brown, Newman, 1989) require considerable
flexibility on the part of the computer. While studies have
shown (Kulik & Kulik, 1976) that CAI can reduce learning
time by up to 30% and improve test scores by up to 10%, when
compared with human-taught courses, it has been felt that such
gains have only just begun to tap into the potential of computers
in education.
The situation on both computational power (and communications
power) and models of teaching and learning is different from
what it has been:
- High-Performance Computing and Communication: The coming generation
of 3-and-4 digit MIP machines and high-bandwidth communications
are providing a quantum jump in what can be carried out: while
previous generations of machines were hard pressed to handle
even text, video and audio are coming to be commonplace on the
computer screens. Moreover, the transmission of such data types
is coming to be seen as routine.
- Learning Through Doing: John Dewey (1916) had it right: he
argued that one learns through direct experience, by being engaged
in authentic tasks. Learning is not, then, a process of transmitting
information from someone who knows to someone who doesn't; rather,
learning is an active process on the part of the learner, where
knowledge and understanding is constructed by the learner. Moreover,
learning is a social process: learning proceeds by and through
conversations. Learning is mediated by the construction of external
artifacts, where the construction of artifacts leads to the construction
of understanding.
Learning through doing dovetails with the integration of computing
and communications into the very fabric of the workplace. Thus,
supporting on the job training, just-in-time learning, learner-centered
design (Soloway, Guzdial, Hay, 1994), etc. via technology makes
a great deal of sense: the computational and communications "zorch"
is up to the task, finally. Moreover, in schools we are seeing
students engaged in what has come to be called "project-based
learning," (e.g., Blumenfeld, et al., 1991) where learning
is centered around an investigation and development of artifacts
and solutions to real problems (e.g., in what ways does my school
waste energy and what can we do about this?). As computer notebooks
(not notebook computers) become commonplace in the classroom,
as they will over the next 5 years, technology in schools will
function for learning much as it functions in the workplace:
as integrated into the very nature of the activities that students
(and workers) engage in. To signal this major change in how
technology is used for learning and teaching, we have coined
the term "interactive learning environment."
In this tutorial, then, we will survey the history of technology
in education, exploring how psychological theories of the mind,
and derived educational theories, have guided the impact of technology
in education. We will expand on the above arguments as to the
promise of interactive learning environments. Specific case
studies will be used to illustrate and support our claims.
The goal of this tutorial is to paint a bigger vision of how
technology can impact learning, teaching and training.
REFERENCES
- Blumenfeld, P., Soloway, E., Marx, R., Krajcik,
J., Guzdial, M., Palincsar, A. (1991) Motivating Project-Based
Learning: Sustaining the Doing, Supporting the Learning, Educational
Psychologist, Vol. 26, No. 3-4.
- Collins, A., Brown, J.S., & Newman., S. (1989)
Cognitive Apprenticeship: Teaching the Craft of Reading, Writing,
and Mathematics, In L.B. Resnick (Ed.) Knowing, Learning,
and Instruction: Essays in Honor of Robert Glaser, Lawrence
Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale, NJ
- Dewey, J. (1916) Democracy and Education,
The Free Press, New York.
- Gardner, H. (1991) The Unschooled Mind, How
Children Think & How Schools Should Teach, BasicBooks,
New York
- Papert, S. (1993) Children's Machines: Rethinking
Education in the Age of the Computer, BasicBooks, New
York
- Skinner, B.F. (1958) Teaching Machines, Science,
128, 889-977
- Soloway, E., Guzdial, M., Hay, K., (1994) Learner-Centered
Design: The Next Challenge for HCI, ACM Interactions, April.
Interactive Learning Environments: Where They've Come
From & Where They're Going/soloway@umich.edu