TEACHING

STRATEGIES: HIGHLY
INTERACTIVE DR KHAIRUL
VIRTUAL JAMALUDIN

ENVIRONMENTS
(HIVES)
What will you learn?

■ What’s HIVEs?
■ Why HIVEs?
■ Interactive levels
■ Designing HIVEs learning
■ How to implement HIVEs?
 Traditional teaching has been
criticized in the literature.
• Teacher-centred learning
• Poor students' involvement
Highly • Less motivating
Interactive
Humans effortlessly create
Virtual virtual situations all the time
Environments • we simulate shaking hands with the
(HIVEs)? person we are scheduled to meet, and we
plan different things we might say.
• Runners imagine the track and plan
where to con- serve energy and where to
spend it
■ We also use virtual environments to do experiments
– Einstein made progress towards his second theory of relativity by imagining he
was riding a light beam.
– Programmers review steps of code in the shower, trying to figure out unintended
consequences.
– teachers use short games to introduce difficult top- ics, and mock trials have been
the staple at law schools for decades.
Do we need Highly Interactive Virtual
Environments (HIVEs) for learning?
“Game as a learning tool”
Games are a more natural way to learn than traditional
classrooms

Chris Crawford, in his book The Art of Computer Game

Design (1984), sug- gests that games are “the most
ancient and time-honored vehicle for education.

psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1990) stated that

the optimal learning state is that of being in “flow” (a
mental state of immersion and clarity)
 “involves emotions and environment”
Knowledge is useful only in
Only if we have an emotional
context, and virtual
stake in the content does our
environments provide a
brain release the chemicals in
context, ideally similar to the
the amygdala and hippocampus
context in which the content
necessary for memory
will eventually be used. (Gee
(Ledoux 1998).
2003)

Combining the context and Experimenting in environments

emotional arguments, many where failure is acceptable is
have argued that failure is therefore necessary to learn
necessary to learn (Klein et al. and ultimately to develop
2007; Keith and Frese 2008). cognitive resiliency.
 “encourages active participation”

Student active
Participation with content
pacrticipation will help Develop sense of
may be necessary for
them to have motivation responsibility
learning.
and desire to learn
So far, what is your
understanding about
HIVEs?
■ Does it only refer to games?
■ Does it mean we do not need
to teach?
■ Does it mean we let students
play all day?
 HIVEs in short
■ A virtual learning environment that is
developed based on the following
elements:
– Simulation element (Real-life
actions, actions affect relevant
systems & feedback and results)
– Pedagogical element (an
experience, ensuring that a
participant ’ s time is spent
productively)
– Game element (techniques that
motivate people to want to engage
an experience, outside of any
intrinsic motivation)
*Sims:
games that includes all
prepackaged educational
simulations and many
serious games and group
chal-lenges, presents some
abstracted world and the
player ’ s role in it, and has
some transferability to the
productive world.

(Aldrich, p.8, 2009)

■ Simulation: Simulations are transferring the way people are learning, using a computer game as
an example and putting forth an unstructured virtual world as a solution (e.g. The Sims).
■ Education simulation: structured environments, abstracted from some specific real-life activity,
with stated levels and goals.
– They allow participants to practice real-world skills with appropriate feedback but without
affecting real processes or people.
■ Virtual worlds: are an infrastructure, analogous to a telephone or television system. Although
some games are created and structured by instructors using an open- ended environment
– 3-D environments where participants from different locations can meet with each other at
the same time. (eg: Second Life) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SANBHTyqOs4
Some activities of virtual worlds (suggested by Karl
Kapp)

Entertainment Classes Meetings Virtual events

Virtual
Data Prototyping/self- Replicating real-
walkthroughs and
visualization expression world facilities
tours

Virtual recruiting Creating

Virtual mentoring Experiencing a machinima
disease state movies
Continued…

■ Serious games are interactive experiences that are easy and fun to engage while building awareness
– usually require no coaching or outside help and even spread through word of mouth,
promoted by people who enjoy playing them (eg: frame game)
– A frame game,: a type of serious game, puts traditional academic content into an engaging
interface such as a game show format.
■ Class games: a short activity to engage students
– Ice-breaker, increasing comfort level between students
– Revealing current student knowledge (used either before a class to customize the content or
after a class to diagnose the amount of content learned)
– Giving the students practice using the infrastructure
– Acting as a lab for subsequent discussion and review

(Aldrich, 2009)
Continued…

■ Virtual classroom tools provide an infrastructure for synchronous (same time,

different location) classes and meetings, integrating voices, slides (including multi -
student “ mark - up ” capabilities), text chat/instant messaging, application sharing, and
various community control tools.
– commonly used today when students in a class are geographically dispersed.
– highly interactive and are currently used as a platform not only for traditional
lectures but also for many types of games and simulations.
■ Group challenges are activities where people have to work together to accomplish
some finite activity.
– Typically, the activity requires participants to take on different roles and discover,
rather than just apply, a solution.
(Aldrich, p.11, 2009)
an American television game show created by
Merv Griffin. The show features a quiz
competition in which contestants are presented
with general knowledge clues in the form of
answers, and must phrase their responses in the
form of questions.
IT’S YOUR
TURN!
LET’S
HEAR
FROM
YOU.
Learning goals in HIVEs

Learning
to know
Undestand themselves
better (including their
able to do new things role in the community
(such as being a leader and how to take
or using project
Learning Learning advantage of their
management skills) to do to be unique strengths)
Aldrich (2009) proposed interactive
levels for learning
Level Descriptor
0 • the instructor speaks regardless of the audience
• often supplemented with PowerPoint slides
• goal is to cover as many points as possible in the given time
• material is easiest to prepare
1 • instructor pauses and asks single-answer questions of the students
• When the question is correctly answered, the class continues
2 • instructor tests the audience and, depending on the collec- tive response, skips ahead
or backtracks.
3 • instructor asks multiple-choice questions of the audience
• students may have the opportunity to defend different answers
• allow for open-ended questions in the chatroom
Continued…
Level Descriptor

4 • Students engage a lab or other process activity that typically has a sin- gle solution
• Example: putting together an engine, making muffins
• can also include minigames (15- to 60-minute online sims that require competency,
successful understanding, use of a system, and encourage a limited amount of
creativity).
• The role of the instructor is starting to be more coachlike.
5 • Students engage an open-ended lab or other activity and create unique content.
• They can express individuality and cleverness that they may want to share and show
off, often via screenshots in a chat room.
• includes the analysis of case studies, the use of interactive spreadsheets
• practiceware sims (a flight-simulator), and the playing of most complex games

6 • students engage in a long, open-ended activity, such as writing a story or creating

and executing a plan.
• the instructor is almost completely an enabler, a coach/facilitator, a resource, even a
spectator.
• Students may use blogs and engage multiday role-plays virtually
Which level do you think is the
best to suit your classroom?
 Designing learning…
“directly correspond to learning goals, and
they model and present an abstracted reality“

Simulation
element

“techniques that motivate people

to want to engage an experi- ence,
“surround an experi- ence, ensuring Pedagogical Game
outside of any intrinsic
that a participant’s time is spent element element
motivation”
productively”
Simulation element

■ directly correspond to learning goals, and they model and present an abstracted reality
■ Considerations:
– Real-life actions: what they can do, interface and does it can be accessed by the
keyboard, mouse, or other input devices
– How the actions affect relevant systems, including maps, buildings, com- munities,
and even chemical processes
– How those systems produce feedback and results
Game element

■ techniques that motivate people to want to engage an experi- ence, outside of any
intrinsic motivation.
■ Include:
– compelling contexts
– cool graphics
– futuristic designs
– the ability to adjust the difficulty level
– encourage achievement of higher scores
– choose an on-screen character’s appearance.
But…. What say you?

“Game elements like competition predictably and almost

inevitably focus stu-dents on getting a high score rather than on
learning the material.”

“Game elements dilute the learning”

“They are subjective. What is fun for one person is not to others”
 Pedagogical element
“surround an experience, ensuring that a participant’s time is spent productively”.
This help the learners to:

avoid developing
superstitious
behavior, such as
believing they are see relationships work through
know how to use the try different apply lessons to the
know what to do influencing between actions or frustration to get to
interface approaches real world.
something by a items faster resolution
particular action
when they are really
not
Right approach, right needs
Create a Sense of Presence via Virtual World
• students feel as if they are physically near other people, not just viewing the same artifacts.
• they change the way that they behave (Bloomfield, 2007)
• The sense of presence can also extend beyond distance learning to purely social situations and to field
trips.
Easily Access Diverse Real-World Communities
• can provide access to real, organic communities, as well as individual experts.

Increase Student Engagement via Games

• can be light and fun, or it can be deep and challenging

Increase Depth of Knowledge via Educational Simulation

• interactive labs can be used in nontraditional areas
OTHER
ADVANTAGES?
Some examples (Aldrich, 2009)
■ Computer games:
– Sid Meier’s Civilization series by Firaxis (http://www.firaxis.com/) for history and social sciences.
– SimCity series by Electronic Arts (http://simcity.ea.com/play/simcity_ classic.php and
http://simcity.ea.com/index.php) for urban planning and social psychology.
– Age of Empires series by Microsoft (www.microsoft.com/games/empires) for history.
■ Specialized games
– Making History (http://www.making-history.com/) for history.
– Skytech by ExperiencePoint (http://www.experiencepoint.com/sims/ SkyTech) for high-level business
skills.
– Capstone Business Simulation (http://www.capsim.com/) for high-level business skills.
– Virtual Leader (and VLeader) (http://www.simulearn.net/) for first-person leadership, organizational
behavior, and interpersonal skills.
– Virtual University (www.virtual-u.org/index.php) for university manage- ment and economics.
Conducting HIVEs…
INFRASTRUCTURE
SELECTION
CRITERIA

SELF-PACED/
SINGLE PLAYER,
ASYNCHRONOUS,
OR SYNCHRONOUS

CONTENT
SELECTION
CRITERIA
 Technology
Accessible

Allow
learning & Infrastructur Instructor
collaboratio e Controls
n

Selection
 For teacher:
instructor manual, facilitator’s guide
Support For students:
Materials Examples of best, typical, and worst plays,
Further reading, Technical support
Recorded grades / progress: frequently asked questions
screenshots, print, or e-mail information

Artifacts
content Curriculu
m
selection Alignment

Considering the topic, skills and focus of

learning that reflect the curriculum

Progression, levels achieved, additional

materials for evaluation evaluation
Selection of format

SELF-PACED/SINGLE ASYNCHRONOUS ? SYNCHRONOUS? MULTIPLE PLAYERS?

PLAYER? (ENGAGE BUT NOT AT (ENGAGE AT THE EXACT
THE SAME TIME) TIME)
Using HIVEs & Teacher’s roles
Play as a class Reviewing

Teaching the
Setting the tone
interface

Intellectual setup

Setting up Addessing
success/failures

Setting up Tracking &

teams/pairs questioning
1. Setting up
Introductory
• access the simulation and perform some simple test before they start class.
• an optional event between normal classes dedicated to getting everyone accessing
the simulation
Intellectual Setup
• present the basic framework and timelines of the simulation: how long it will take,
how it will be graded, assignments to teams, and how to access the simulation.

Tone
• Ensure instruction is clear before begin
2. From real life to simulation
• “Across history, what was the most wasteful war, in terms of
Ask for personal stories or resources spent and the lack of real gains accomplished?”
opinion related to the focus
• “How would you define a successful peace negotiation? What
Ask the class to define the would the outcome look like?”
value of the activity
• “How would you define a successful peace negotiation? What
Ask for a definition would the outcome look like?”

• “I want half the class to argue that appeasement is a good

Set up a mock debate strategy, and the other half to argue that going to war is a good
strategy.”

• “With whom right now, in your personal life, are you in a fight?
Have students write down a You don’t have to share it with the class, but you do have to pick a
lingering problem or question real example.”
3. Teaching the interface

1 2 3 4
understand all Introduce the show a draw analogies
their potential invisible and screenshot to people’s own
actions before underlying lives.
they begin system
4. Public simulation play

The coach can use the controls, talking through the actions.
• Here, the coach takes over and plays through the level, talking aloud about various decisions. This is the
fastest approach, and the easiest, but the least interactive.
The coach can use the controls, asking the group what to do.
• This focuses the group on the strategic aspects of the simulation, although it can gloss over interface issues.

An individual student can be chosen to take the controls and play through the level.
• This demonstrates a “real” person using the interface, making common mis- takes and common discoveries.
It builds community and even sympathy. It also focuses the group on the interface issues as well as the
strategic ones.
An individual can be chosen to take the controls, but told by the group what to do.
• This has all the advantages of the other approaches, but it can also take the longest, sometimes building
impatience in the group.
5. Addressing success and failure

A perfect play shows the class

that perfection is possible
• It can create in the students
Deliberately failing creates a
the unresolved tension and
different dynamic
desire to “solve the puzzle.

Encouragement is key!
6. Grouping students

■ Matching People with Buddies

– The buddy relationship can be short term: buddies might share a screen or meeting
room and provide feedback and comments.
– The buddy relationship can also be informal or formal. The more impor- tant the
material learned, especially when big skills are being covered, the more important
the role and responsibility of buddies.
■ Teams
– group students into teams and perhaps even assign roles within the team.
– Most simulation teams ideally are about five people.
7. Coaching

■ The Right Amount of Hand-Holding

– offers a tremendous amount of hand-holding for every step of the way.
– visit each group virtually.
■ Ongoing Roles: Tracking and Questioning
– make sure that all students are engaged and none are forced into “cram” situations, when
simu- lations work remarkably poorly.
– ask questions: These questions can be aimed at individual students or, better, to the group
as a whole.
– Ask their strategy, actions and expected outcomes
■ Ongoing Player Comparison
– share some aspect of each other’s progress or lack thereof
8. After action review (debriefing)
students will better
a pedagogical typically after the core
understand what Explain strategic
technique of using gameplay
happened and what implications
focused sessions implementation
should have happened.

Evidences & feedback

• raw material, such as recorded plays and timelines,

• analysis (what happened and why at a thematic level),
• coaching (how to get better results next time, and perhaps how to
transfer to real-life situations from the perspective of an expert or
peers)
• evaluation for certification (the player’s readiness to handle real
situations),
• game elements like a high score or rewards and recognition, which
can spur competition and replay/redo.
 9. Simulation to real life
• “Can I see a show of hands how many people have learned about
Ask the students what they have learned and what
they see and do differently as a result
X?”

• “Remember when team X accomplished this? I bet no one thought

Highlight some great plays (or at least great results)
and shared humor
that was even possible.”

Recall the content from the on-ramping session, • “Go back to your notes. Look at what you wrote down before we
and ask if any of the personal challenges brought started the sim. That thing that was a big challenge, that concept that
up then can now be resolved was hard to get, is it any more clear now?”

• “We have learned X, Y, and Z.”

Highlight the key lessons learned

Get students focused on next steps, if any,

including an action plan.

Let the students know how and when they can

reaccess the sim and what help is available for
them.
 Test (pre and post) on related topic/skills

Write a paper about your experience

Reflective practices Keep a Journal during the
Experience

Assessment Create a Multimedia

static screenshots, in-world video
clips, real-world video and

of learning Production photographs, voiceover, text on

screen, and even music.

Peer assessment

Replay and modify action plan

REFLECTION

What is HIVEs? Strengths? Weaknesses? What are the steps What kind of
in conducting assessment that you
HIVEs? can do?
THANK YOU
Reference:

Aldrich, C. (2009). Learning Online with Games, Simulations, and Virtual Worlds:
Strategies For Online Instruction. Market Street, San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons,
Inc
For next class:

■ Form three groups.

■ Select a topic for each group:
– assessment for learning
– assessment as learning
– assessment of learning
■ Share your findings in our next class (15-20 mins)