Utilising the virtual learning environment to encourage faculty reflection and improve the student learning experience

Student evaluations of teaching (SETs) are the most frequent form of faculty performance in the classroom, though they tend to be used as summative rather than formative evaluations. In this chapter, a project involving the use of a virtual learning environment for formative, weekly SETs is explored from both the student and faculty point of view at a rural university college in the United Kingdom. This project encouraged student participation in creating the learning environment and faculty reflection on how to improve the student experience. From the student perspective, the weekly anonymous evaluations were useful for providing feedback; however, students tended to only respond if they were not satisfied with the faculty member. The exception to this was that some students were more motivated to complete the evaluation forms if they believed the faculty member was utilising their feedback. From the faculty perspective, the feedback was not as detailed as they had expected, and some questioned whether it was worth the effort of conducting formative evaluations if the response rate was so low. Others used the feedback for reflective purposes, and it was found that those that reflected on their work at higher levels tended to receive a greater year-on-year increase in their end of year teaching evaluations.

Touching space: Using motion capture and stereo projection to create a "virtual haptics" of dance

This paper describes the work of a group of artists in Australia who used real-time motion capture and 3D stereo projection to create a large-scale performance environment in which dancers seemed to "touch" the volume. This project re-versions Suzanne Langer's 1950s philosophy of dance as "virtual force" to realize the idea of a "virtual haptics" of dance that extends the dancer's physical agency literally across and through the surrounding spatial volume. The project presents a vision of interactive dance performance that "touches" space by visualizing kinematics as intentionality and agency. In doing so, we suggest the possibility of new kinds of human-computer interfaces that emphasize touch as embodied, nuanced agency that is mediated by the subtle qualities of whole-body movement, in addition to more goal-oriented, task-based gestures such as pointing or clicking. © 2010.

Building the computational virtual reality environment for anaesthetists' training and practice

Understanding the real world based on visualisation and prediction is essential for the decision-maker. We build a computational virtual reality environment to improve visualisation, understanding and prediction of the physical world and to guide action. It develops a five-dimensional, computer-generated, computational Virtual Reality Environment for Anaesthesia (VREA). Our online prediction will be calculated based on the correlation and composition computing with respect to the three dimensions: horizontal, vertical and individual. The novel musical notes based anesthetic simulator is proposed to identify the abnormality and visualize the online medical time series. The experiments with the online ECG data will present a real-time case to show the effectiveness and efficiency of our proposed system and algorithms.

Assessing students’ experiences in a virtual learning environment

CONTEXTTechnology has played an important role in the provision of educational equity for learners inAustralian communities. Engaging off-campus students through technology resources is vital for avirtual learning environment in engineering education. To ensure a positive experience for thestudents in off-campus (virtual) learning, the use of modern technology is crucial for collaborative andactive learning.PURPOSEDesign based education is a combination of project based and problem based approaches. Throughsmall or big projects, students work in teams with combinations of off-campus and on-campusstudents. Integration of technology resources takes place within these groups through collaborativelearning and active learning. Even though the facilities and technology support are provided for offcampusstudents, there is always a gap in fulfilling the off-campus students’ learning expectations in avirtual learning environment. Technology plays an important role in providing student engagement insolving design problems, which is a need for the distance learner community in future. The purpose ofthis study is to evaluate students’ experiences on the use of technology in learning and teaching,which is delivered in off-campus mode.APPROACHThe cohorts of students involved in this online survey are from first year undergraduate engineering inTrimester 2, 2016. The online survey analysis of students’ perceptions will help teaching staff to betterunderstand and assess off-campus students’ experiences, challenges and barriers in a virtual learningenvironment.RESULTSThe distance learners’ experiences are analysed from an online survey. This online survey analysesthe students’ experiences on use of technology and how it supports and enhances students learning indistance mode. It also analyses the student learning experiences on project/design-based learningapproach in engineering. In this particular unit (Electrical Systems), students work in teams of 2-3 onlab work and other assignments. The analysed results also discuss the students’ perceptions onteamwork, communication, interaction and assessment.CONCLUSIONSThe aim of the engineering curriculum is to provide learning and teaching support equally for both oncampusand off-campus students. From the analysed survey results, this study reveals that the use oftechnology plays a vital role in students learning from availability and accessibility of materials toassessment methods, lab tutorials, and online seminars. In a project/design based learningcurriculum, the distance learners have an equal opportunity to enhance the learning skills as the oncampusstudents experience in a study environment.

Wikis: collaborative virtual learning environments

Ward Cunningham used the word wiki (the Hawaiian word meaning quick) to name the collaborative tool he developed for use on the internet in 1994. Wikis are fully editable websites. Users can visit, read, re-organize and update the structure and content (text and pictures) of a wiki as they see fit. This functionality is called open editing (Leuf & Cunningham, 2001). All a user needs to edit and read a wiki, is a web browser. Consequently, the wiki has great potential for use as a collaborative virtual learning environment. Wikis abound on the internet. A well known wiki is Wikipedia an online collaborative encyclopaedia, where anybody can read, edit, re-organize and update the encyclopaedia content (Wikipedia, 2004).

Faster, richer, better: rapid appraisal techniques for the study of IS implementation in virtual communities

A major issue in Information Systems (IS) research is how to combine relevance and rigor (Benbasat and Zmud, 1999) and reduce the widening gap between research results and adoption (Dunn, 1994). Qualitative researchers make use of interpretivist methods to add richness and depth to their understanding of user problems. Interpretivist methods applied to IS implementations can thus result in research which communicates those findings more effectively. However standard interpretivist data-collection and analysis methods can be time-consuming and expensive. Findings based on these methods may be irrelevant to practitioners by the time they reach publication stage. A potential solution to this problem lies in Rapid Appraisal or RA, a qualitative appraisal methodology derived from rural development-related research. It offers IS researchers an additional technique for learning and acquiring relevant information in a limited period of time that  supplements current data collection and analysis techniques. RA adds value to the traditional approach for studying diffusion of innovation, supporting and extending the IS researcher’s qualitative ‘tool-kit’. In this paper we review an electronic gateway designed to facilitate the diffusion of an Australian government to business [G2B] export documentation system, EXDOC, which was first implemented with meat producers. RA techniques were used to collect and analyse data regarding the implementation of the first regional Electronic Trade Facilitation Center [ETFC] successfully established for Australian exporters in the horticulture sector. The findings from the original EXDOC implementation in the meat sector were confirmed and extended through this study. These include the importance of developing a governance structure that ensures all community members share the benefits of an implementation and the fact that virtual trading communities are attractive to users only if they add value to their business and extend standard ways of operating. Interactive interviews, part of the RA approach; also enabled us to expand our understanding of the way in which procedures developed in the course of implementing an electronic market represent value-adding opportunities for virtual trading communities. The paper has special relevance for researchers investigating adoption and diffusion issues experienced by small-scale producers with low exposure to technology in remote and rural settings.

Learning in virtual teams: exploring the student experience

In 2005 an existing undergraduate course in project management was converted from face-to-face mode to wholly online mode. Wholly online mode means that there are no face-to-face classes at all, and all teaching and learning is facilitated through an online environment.

The revised project management course was designed with an underlying problem-based learning (PBL) pedagogy and used a simulated, fictitious telecommunications company, United Enterprises (UE), as a case study learning resource. The students worked in virtual teams to complete online learning activities and to solve authentic project management tasks for UE. Employees of UE were available online to provide direction and answer further questions about the tasks.

The overall research study used an action research methodology in which feedback was elicited from two groups of stakeholders involved in the project management course - students and teaching staff. The feedback was used to plan, develop and implement the new Information Technology (IT) Professional Practice course.

This paper reports on the findings of three anonymous student surveys that were conducted after each of the main project management topics and tasks were completed. The surveys sought feedback in a number of areas. However, the feedback reported here relates specifically to student opinions about their experiences of working in virtual teams within the learning environment. Other aspects of the research, including student perceptions of UE and feedback from the teaching staff, are not reported here.

Across the three surveys, most students indicated that they valued the opportunity to discuss various aspects of the course with peers and teaching staff online, and to interact with real-life employees of UE. Although discussion forums were the prescribed method for communication other forms of communication such as email, chat and face-to-face meetings were also used. According to the students, the best things about online group work were that it provides the flexibility of time and place; it allows communication and participation to be recorded; and is an ‘efficient’ way of working. The worst things about online group work were that communication is more difficult and that team members leave participation and submission to
the last minute. While up to 15 percent of students did not like the experience of online group work at all, overall students were generally satisfied with this style of learning and enjoyed the experience of working collaboratively within a virtual team.

The research has highlighted a number of areas where improvements can be made to the student experience of working in virtual teams. These improvements will be adopted in the development and delivery of the new course as part of the action research study.

A facility for the integration of live and virtual environments in realtime

This paper describes a research facility which has been established to explore the integration of live and virtual environments in real-time. The facility combines digital ontput from both live and electronic sources such as video, animatinos and 3D virtual environments and enables the monitoring and control of the interaction between live actors and the digital enviromnents. This provides a research environment in which the interaction between participants in the design and construction process and 3D virtual buildings can be investigated. This will lead to the enhancement of decision making and planning in the design and construction process.

Problem-based learning in an online environment

This study describes the investigation of postgraduate students of mixed age and gender distributed across several Australian states as well as off shore who were juggling study with workplace demands. As face to face meeting was impossible because of the geographical distribution of the group members and because the course communication was centred on an online conference space, a small group space was established for each group for the purpose of completing the problem-based learning task. This paper provides a detailed description of the group dynamics and interactive processes required to negotiate an online problem-based learning task. It will also suggest ways to improve the collaborative learning potential of the online environment through well structured and meaningful activities.

Poesis in diegesis : real-time interactive dance performance

This paper describes the processes of creating a hybrid experience of live performance and virtual imagery in 1 + x: Mid-range Projections, a dance work that uses real-time processing of live feed video to create a duet between dancers and their virtual images. 1 + x is about creating experiences of interiority and intimacy, ironically, through the juxtaposition of virtual images of performers with their real selves. This paper examines how the ideal of reinserting intimacy, humanity and 'presence' into a technologically generated image space, in the case of 1 + x, depends on the precise and delicate manipulation of live-feed video in collaboration with the audience's experience of interactivity. The result is a performance work that creates a poesis of 'presence', through a diegesis that melds real and virtual images on the same screen and the same conceptual and spatial plane - a 'becoming virtual'.

Database for structural steel experiments under a distributed collaboration environment

Due to the high requirements of civil infrastructures against the earthquake in Japan, a great number of research organizations have been conducting the structural steel experiments, in particular the seismic tests such as the cyclic loading test and the pseudo-dynamic test, for many years to determine the seismic performances of steel structures. However, the original test data gained by most research organizations are not well stored in an appropriate manner for distribution and possible usage of others. Although a Numerical Database of Steel Structures (NDSS) was developed some years ago to preserve and share experimental data of the ultimate strength tests acquired at Nagoya University, it was not easy to access this database from other computer platform due to the lack of the support of proper communication media. With the rapid development of information networks and their browsers, structural engineers and researchers are able to exchange various types of test data through Internet. This paper presents the development of a distributed collaborative database system for structural steel experiments. The database is made available on the World-Wide Web, and the Java language enables the interactive retrieval efficiently. The applications of the developed database system for the retrieval of experimental data and seismic numerical analysis are validated in the form of examples.

Interactive dance performance : movement data and the 'materiality' of the system

This paper describes a recent performance work I made using dance and live feed video
processing, 1 + x: mid-range projections, commissioned by the Seoul Contemporary Dance
Company and first performed in Melbourne in July 2005. This work forms a basis for discussing
my interest in creating performance images that reveal 'interiority'. I am interested in how you
embed the 'feel' of the human systematically in an interactive structure, and how that process
can produce a poetic that arises from the detailed and nuanced play between real and virtual
images on the same screen. How do you abstract and play with a performer's movement, play
with it in real and virtual time, so that it gives the work an emotional charge? Its like playing with
the process of 'becoming virtual' - and I'm being deliberately Deleuzian about that - how do you
'become virtual' in the sense of melding performer and image so that the meaning exists
between - in the connection between the two?

This quest to get the energy, the 'lived', 'felt' quality of the movement into the imagery gives rise
to research questions about how 'presence' is perceived in movement. What elements of the
raw movement data do you need to keep and what can you throwaway, and still keep the
personality, the emotion, the 'life' of that movement? How do you make a virtual, interactive
performance system that has its own 'materiality'?