The intrinsic motivation to play, and therefore to learn, that might be provided by digital educational games teases researchers and developers. However, existing educational games often fail in their attempt to compete with commercial games and to provide successful learning. Often some learning is added to digital games or some gameplay is added to educational applications. Successful educati...

In this paper, we present a study to evaluate the impact of adaptive feedback on the effectiveness of a pedagogical agent for an educational computer game. We compare a version of the game with no agent, and two versions with agents that differ only in the accuracy of the student model used to guide the agent’s interventions. We found no difference in student learning across the three condition...

In this brief pedagogical overview the physical basis of the deviation of the nucleon shape from spherical symmetry will be presented along with the experimental methods used to determine it by the γp → ∆ reaction.The fact that significant non-spherical electric(E2) and Coulomb quadrupole(C2) amplitudes have been observed will be demonstrated. These multipoles for the N,∆ system as a function o...

This paper reports on the research work carried out by the authors in the framework of the IAMEL project, supported by the Italian Ministry of Education. The project was mainly aimed at enhancing the teaching/learning of mathematics by providing teachers with specific e-learning platforms endowed with a number of dedicated tools supporting the setting-up and the carrying-out of specific in-fiel...

We report the results of a randomized controlled evaluation of the effectiveness of pedagogical agents as providers of affective feedback. These digital learning companions were embedded in an intelligent tutoring system for mathematics, and were used by approximately one hundred students in two public high schools. Students in the control group did not receive the learning companions. Results ...

The relationship between emotions and learning was investigated by tracking the emotions that college students experienced while learning about computer literacy with AutoTutor. AutoTutor is an animated pedagogical agent that holds a conversation in natural language, with spoken contributions by the learner. Thirty students completed a multiple-choice pre-test, a 35-minute training session, and...

We present initial steps towards an interactive essay writing tutor that improves science knowledge by analyzing student essays for misconceptions and recommending science webpages that help correct those misconceptions. We describe the five components in this system: identifying core science concepts, determining appropriate pedagogical sequences for the science concepts, identifying student m...

This paper aims at the conception of an affective and animated pedagogical agent responsible for the interface of the environment with the student and for considering the affective aspects of the interaction with the student in a learning environment. The agent catches the student's affective state by his observable behavior, and applies tactics according to the student's affective state. We be...

There is a real need for studies on learning from multimedia with school-age children, even pre-school children. In this research, temporal speech cueing was proposed to help young children as they listened to a speaking pedagogical agent direct their attention to details in on-screen text and graphics. An experiment was conducted with 4th and 5th graders (n = 133) who read on-screen text, and ...

Some economist educators are lecturing less, and making use of teaching techniques that engage students more actively. Here we discuss a number of pedagogical strategies that do just that, with the aim of encouraging critical thinking on controversial economic issues. The three specific examples discussed in the paper are 1) a simulation to model the different social locations of various econom...