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TARAMAWOS WOS:000683650400001 TARAMASCOPUS In light of the recent developments in mobile technologies and students’ increased uses of these platforms for educational purposes, research on mobileassisted learning is gaining increased attention. Within this line of inquiry, the current study explored vocabulary learning outcomes from paper and mobile application flashcards. The study used a repeated measures design, by exposing the participants (55 high-school students) to different learning conditions and testing their receptive knowledge of core vocabulary in English in three junctures of time over a year. The participants were asked to use digital or paper flashcards for vocabulary learning, and two standard measures of vocabulary knowledge in pre- and post-tests were used to compare vocabulary gains. The results revealed that both groups improved their vocabulary knowledge over time. Nevertheless, the participants in the experimental group who used mobile applications outperformed the control group (paper flashcards) in the post-tests, and the effect size of the observed differences was very large. The findings underscore the long-term impacts of mobile-assisted vocabulary learning, and the affordances provided by such platforms for learning a considerable number of words by EFL learners. The findings also promise implications for language learners/teachers and materials developers in English language teaching programmes.

Under the rapid advances of digital technology, traditional paper-based forms of reading and writing are steadily giving way to digital-based literacies, in theory as well as in application. Drawing on a study of literacy in a medical workplace context, this article examines critically the shift toward computer-mediated textual practices. While a considerable body of research has investigated benefits and issues associated with digital literacy tools in medicine, we consider the affordances of paper-based practices. Our analysis of verbal interaction and textual artifacts drawn from a qualitative study of oncology visits indicates that the uses of pen and paper are advantageous for both doctor and patient. Specifically, they allow doctors to process and package information in ways that are favorable to their personal modus operandi, and they enable patients to participate in the medical visit and take an active role in managing their medical treatment. Understanding the affordances of paper-based literacy provides insights for refining digital tools as well as for motivating the design of possible hybrid forms and digital-analog intersections that can best support medical practices.

The papers in this issue provide an excellent example of how pertinent distinctions which emerge from analysis of significant data sets can be communicated to colleagues and used to make sense of observations. The distinctions are vividly described, illustrated and exemplified, and used to chart maturation in student use of examples from middle school, through high school and into university. Curiously, no corresponding maturation was detected in students’ choice of examples to use for themselves. Contrast was detected between the way students used the same examples for comprehending a conjecture and testing its validity, and the way that some mathematicians used specifically constructed examples for locating underlying structure. What emerged for me from reading these papers is confirmation of the central role of attention, the productiveness of engaging students at the earliest ages and throughout their schooling with the detection and expression of generality, and the importance of being explicit about the scope of generality encompassed by a claim. Purposeful use of examples by students could be expected to develop as teachers explicitly use examples purposefully with and for students. A reasonable conjecture might be that getting students to be explicit about the scope of generality, of possible variation of which they are aware, might shed light on obstacles and barriers to reasoning which might otherwise lead to proof.

International conference presentations represent one of the biggest challenges for academics using English as a Lingua Franca (ELF). This paper aims to initiate exploration into the multimodal academic discourse of oral presentations, including the verbal, written, non-verbal material (NVM) and body language modes. It offers a Systemic Functional Linguistic (SFL) and multimodal framework of presentations to enhance mixed-disciplinary ELF academics' awareness of what needs to be taken into account to communicate effectively at conferences. The model is also used to establish evaluation criteria for the presenters' talks and to carry out a multimodal discourse analysis of four well-rated 20-min talks, two from the technical sciences and two from the social sciences in a workshop scenario. The findings from the analysis and interviews indicate that: (a) a greater awareness of the mode affordances and their combinations can lead to improved performances; (b) higher reliance on the visual modes can compensate for verbal deficiencies; and (c) effective speakers tend to use a variety of modes that often overlap but work together to convey specific meanings. However, firm conclusions cannot be drawn on the basis of workshop presentations, and further studies on the multimodal analysis of ‘real conferences’ within specific disciplines are encouraged.

This paper presents an analysis of a hundred and one handwritten essays by master students in Informatics. The students reflected on their experiences of working with pen and paper for reading and writing as a mandatory assignment for the duration of a five-week intensive course. Taking an inductive approach, reflexive thematic analysis was used to identify patterns of meaning across the full dataset. The essays elicited insightful student reflections on learning, knowing, and being. One overarching theme, New connections, and four sub-theses were identified: Handwriting as note making, Being present for learning, Freedom to think, and Materiality of reading and writing. This study contributes to an improved understanding of the affordances of paper and laptops in the lecture room, based on a student-centred approach, and reflects on how student perspectives can be implemented during lectures.

This pictorial presents a design investigation at the intersection of paper and computer vision for tangible interfaces. Through this exploration, we uncovered various characteristics of paper that connect tangible interactions with concealing and revealing printed fiducial markers for detection-particularly through the affordances of paper craft and fiber. We illustrate a variety of paper structures that construct and deconstruct fiducial markers. We also demonstrate how these structures enable untethered functional physical inputs, such as push buttons and sliders. We showcase four proposals that extend these material insights into tangible interface applications, including interactive data physicalizations and functional paper prototypes. Furthermore, we continue the legacy of pictorials by exposing fabrication drawings for others to engage with this work at a more practical level.

Game map interfaces provide an alternative perspective on the worlds players inhabit.compared to navigation applications popular in day-to-day life, game maps have different affordances to match players' situated goals. To contextualize and understand these differences and how they developed, we present a historical chronicle of game map interfaces. Starting from how games came to involve maps, we trace how maps are first separate from the game, becoming more and more integrated into play until converging in smartphone-style interfaces. We synthesize several game history texts with critical engagement with 123 key games to develop this map-focused chronicle, from which we highlight trends and opportunities for future map designs. Our work contributes a record of trends in game map interfaces that can serve as a source of reference and inspiration to game designers, digital physical-world map designers, and game scholars.

Paper has existed as a communications 'platform' for thousands of years. It's 'versioning history' spans papyrus, parchment and pulp, and when paper became a scalable and mass-production item, most famously via the Guttenberg press, it sparked unparalleled social and political change. It's a technology that's had 'impact'. More recently, News and Information - a sector with paper at its core - has seen substantial editorial and commercial disruption from digital communications networks. This paper outlines a collaborative project between journalism, media and technology researchers, and commercial product designers, exploring the potential of paper-based web-connected objects. Our work examines how emergent conductive ink technologies could offer a disruptive alternative to existing media products, and explores how to create, power and populate a connected paper platform, and analyse user activity. Through a range of industry partnerships with newspaper, magazine and book publishers, our research creates new paper affordances and interactions, and positions paper as a digital disruptor.

Networking and team working are becoming the foundations of human performance in educational, organizational and recreational settings. Here, new communities of practice are being established to promote an engagement economy that will be able to foster innovation and success by sustaining collective well-being and group flourishing. Considered as “positive technologies”, Serious Games (SGs) can support these processes. By fostering continuous learning experiences blended with entertaining affordances, SGs have in fact been able to shape new opportunities for human psychological training and assessment. However, despite the impressive growth of SGs applications, only a few of them have been tested and scientifically considered from an empirical point of view. Our study tries to address this gap, evaluating the potential of digital game technology compared to paper-based applications not only among individuals, but also among groups. The study, conducted with Mind the Game, a multiplayer SG, involved 75 students. Preliminary results showed only minor but fundamental differences between the two experimental conditions. On the one hand, groups who experienced the paper-based condition felt more competent than groups exposed to the digital experience, reporting higher levels of negative feelings too. On the other hand, groups exposed to the digital condition described themselves as more challenged and efficient in a collective way.

The aim of this article is to investigate the impact of digital technologies on writing and reading within an educational rather than business environment. It explores the affordances of writing and reading on paper and those of writing on a keyboard and reading on a screen. The analysis is based on an exploratory study carried out with a class of Masters Students in Multimedia Communication and Technologies of Information at the University of Udine (Italy) who were asked to write an essay on this topic. The methodology applied in this study is qualitative content analysis of the essays produced by the students. The principal results of this study show that reading and writing competencies are changing with the use of digital technologies but that paper and digital interactions are not mutually exclusive. Students are more productive textually with writing than with reading, however, they still see the virtues of writing on paper which they continue to use extensively. It appears that chirographic writing and paper is more multi-sensorial and meta-communicative than using the keyboard or screen. Further research is recommended to explore this complementarities of writing on paper and on screen/keyboard as well as the perceived changes in preferred sources of reading material.

Due to its distinct affordances, the iPad might foster alternative forms of collaborative creativity when compared with pens on paper. In this article I examine how a collaborative drawing task among five pairs of 5-6 year olds unfolded on paper and on the iPad, framing the investigation through the concept of multimodal participation frameworks. Through multimodal analysis of 25 episodes of video observation, I focus on the multimodal actions that comprised the children’s collaborative creativity and identify three patterns of interaction: 1) working together, 2) collaboration ‘coming loose’ and 3) vying for control. I then explore how the affordances of the resources used were implicated in these distinct patterns of interaction. The analysis suggests that participation frameworks were tighter and more focused on the task when children drew via the iPad, perhaps because the resources were more physically confined, the screen was harder to see and the drawing app produced a novel and dynamic visual effect. During collaborative drawing on paper, the pens often acted as a distractor, drawing attention away from the drawing and disrupting the fluency of turn-taking. These findings suggest the need to challenge the popular perception that iPads facilitate solitary game-playing and video-watching at the expense of collaborative creativity.

Our work presents a method to use paper as an input device while reading on a mobile device, where the user turns a physical page in the real world in order to turn a page in the digital world. Our goal in this work is to replicate the feedback and affordances one would receive from a printed book on a mobile device, where to fully replicate the reading experience the user would need to turn pages as they would naturally with a printed book. Through a small study we discovered a number of ways that pages are often turned and these techniques became vital to the project. We describe a prototype device which uses paper as an input device with transparent electrodes and bend sensors embedded to pages, so that the turning and bending of pages can be digitally detected and addressed. The prototype is able to detect the page turns and bends made by the user and the state of each page.

Multiple loci of control is one of the main affordances of tangible tabletop UIs due to their capability for simultaneous manipulation. However, there is a tension between the efficiency given by simultaneous manipulation and the need to coordinate and reflect in group activity. We implemented a central point of control to synchronize the group work and afford opportunities for equal participation in a tabletop application. In this study, we analyzed log and video data of seven groups of primary school students using a tabletop application. The results show that log data about this central control's position and rotation can be a predictor of equal participation, also helping interpret group performance. Finally, we discuss the implications of such findings, e.g., to provide teachers with useful information about group collaborative processes.

This paper presents the development of an educational immersive virtual reality (IVR) program considering both technological and pedagogical affordances of such learning environments. The CDIO Stan ...

Despite the advent of a flurry of digital technologies, paper prevails on manufacturing shopfloors. To understand the roles and value of paper on the shopfloor, we have studied the manufacturing practices at two state-of-the-art automotive supplier facilities, applying ethnographic fieldwork, in-depth interviews, as well as photo and document analysis. We find that paper has unique affordances that today's digital technologies cannot easily supplant on current shopfloors. More specifically, we find four paper practices: (1) creating and adapting individual information spaces, (2) reinterpreting information, (3) combining information handover with social interaction, and (4) visual cuing. We discuss these practices and the unique affordances of paper that currently support shopfloor workers and also consider the limitations of paper, which are becoming increasingly apparent, since more tasks increasingly depend on real-time information.

The purpose of our research is to support cognitive, motor, and emotional development of severely disabled children in the school context. We designed and implemented a set of novel learning experiences that are both low-cost and easily customizable, and combine the visual communication paradigm of Augmented Alternative Communication (ACC) with multimedia tangible technology. Using an application framework developed at our lab (called "Talking Paper"), teachers and therapists can easily associate conventional paper based elements (e.g., PCS cards, drawings, pictures) to multimedia resources (videos, sounds, animations), and create playful interactive spaces that are customized to the specific learning needs of each disabled child. Paper based elements work as visual representations for the concepts children must learn, as communication devices, and as physical affordances for interacting with multimedia resources. The paper presents the approach and its application in a real school context, highlighting the benefits for both disabled and non disabled children. The latter were involved as co-designers of multimedia contents and learning activities. Their creative participation favored group-binding and increased tolerance and sense of community in the classroom, so that the overall project became a means for real inclusive education.

This paper describes what we believe to be important initial steps toward realizing a novel computational medium that combines elements of programming, painting, and papercrafts. Briefly, this genre of paper computing allows a user to create functional computational artifacts on painted paper substrates. We introduce a construction kit for paper computing that consists of computational elements---microcontrollers, sensors, actuators, and power sources---that are held on paper surfaces by magnetic paint and magnets. Conductive paint applied to these surfaces takes on the role of "wires", connecting the computational elements to one another. These elements can be moved around and from surface to surface, much like magnets on a refrigerator, and the overall result is a tangible medium in which painting, programming, and the affordances of paper blend together. In addition to introducing the kit, we describe example constructions and discuss a variety of potential applications, design projects, and issues for continued research.

Paper occupies a special place in histories of knowledge. It is the substrate of communication, the stuff of archives, the bearer of marks that make worlds. For the early-modern period in particular we now have a wealth of studies of 'paper tools', of the ways in which archives were assembled and put to use, of the making of lists and transcribing of observations, and so on. In other fields, too, attention has turned to the materiality of information. How far is it possible to draw a stable methodology out of the insights of literary and book historians, bibliographers, anthropologists, and those working in media studies? Do these diverse fields in fact refer to the same thing when they talk of paper, its qualities, affordances and limitations? In attempting to answer these questions, the present essay begins in the rich territory of early-modern natural philosophy - but from there opens out to take in recent works in a range of disciplines. Attending to the specific qualities of paper is only possible, I argue, if it is understood that paper can be both transparent and opaque depending on the social world it inhabits and helps to constitute. Paper flickers into and out of view, and it is precisely this quality that constitutes its sociomateriality.

The current article investigates the affordances associated with paper out of the motivation that this can help inform design of pervasive and ubiquitous computing solutions for clinical use. In particular, we will focus on paper-based medication charts, and discuss how these artifacts differ from various digital and context-aware solutions both in terms of media properties and functionalities. Based on a comparison of media, we argue that the affordances offered by the paper-based medication charts are not fully transferable to one digital medium, but that a combination of complementary digital media is required.

Computationally-enriched crafts are activities that blend the advantages of computational media with the affective, social, and cognitive affordances of children's crafts. In this paper, we describe a design application, Popup Workshop, whose purpose is to introduce children to the craft (and engineering discipline) of pop-up design in paper. We describe the fundamental ideas behind computational crafts in general, present our application in its current implementation and offer a scenario for its use, explore the particular ways in which pop-up design serves as fertile ground for integrating computation and tangible design, and discuss our early pilot tests with elementary-school children, as well as ongoing and related work.

This study compared changes in cognitive, affective, and postural aspects of interaction during shared mother and child book reading on screen and on paper. Readers commonly express strong preferences for reading on paper, but several studies have shown marginal, if any, effects of text medium on cognitive outcomes such as recall. Shared reading with a parent is an engaging, affective and embodied experience across time, as well as a cognitive task, so it is important to understand how paper vs. screen affects broader aspects of these shared experiences. Mid-childhood sees a steep rise in screen use alongside a shift from shared to independent reading. We assessed how the medium of paper or screen might alter children’s shared reading experiences at this transitional age. Twenty-four 7- to 9-year-old children and their mothers were videotaped sharing a story book for 8 min in each of four conditions: mother or child as reader, paper, or tablet screen as medium. We rated videotapes for interaction warmth and child engagement by minute and analyzed dyadic postural synchrony, mothers’ commentaries and quality of children’s recall, also interviewing participants about their experiences of reading and technology. We found no differences in recall quality but interaction warmth was lower for screen than for paper, and dropped over time, notably when children read on screen. Interactions also differed between mother-led and child-led reading. We propose that mother - child posture for paper reading supported more shared activity and argue that cultural affordances of screens, together with physical differences between devices, support different behaviors that affect shared engagement, with implications for the design and use of digital technology at home and at school. We advocate studying embodied and affective aspects of shared reading to understand the overall implications of screens in children’s transition to independent reading.

Although high school physics students solve problems using the expression E = mc2, the origin of this expression and its deep conceptual meaning are hardly ever discussed due to students' limited prior knowledge. In 1946, a year after the atomic bombs were first dropped, Albert Einstein published a popular scientific paper explaining the equivalence between mass and energy to the general public and the implications of this principle for our daily lives. This paper describes the utilization of Einstein's paper in a high-school physics lesson on the equivalence of mass and energy, and discusses the instructional affordances of discussing exemplary popular scientific texts in a physics lesson.

Holographic displays have the potential to reproduce the natural parallax and focusing affordances of real scenes. Although holographic displays are still far from maturity, no other display technologies have the potential to reproduce these affordances as accurately. This paper outlines current methods for generating images using electronic holography, and reviews visual human-factors considerations for current and future holographic displays.

To combine the affordances of paper and computers, prior research has proposed numerous interactive paper systems that link specific paper document content to digital operations such as multimedia playback and proofreading. Yet, it remains unclear to what degree these systems bridge the inherent gap between paper and computers when compared to existing paper-only and computer-only interfaces. In particular, given the special properties of paper, such as limited dynamic feedback, how well does an average new user learn to master the interactive paper system? What factors affect the user performance? And how does the paper interface work in a typical use scenario? To answer these questions, we conducted two empirical experiments on a generic pen-gesture-based command system, called PapierCraft [Liao et al. 2008], for paper-based interfaces. With it, people can select sections of printed document and issue commands such as copy and paste, linking and in-text search. The first experiment focused on the user performance of drawing pen gestures on paper. It proves that users can learn the command system in about 30 minutes and achieve a performance comparable to a table PC-based interface supporting the same gestures. The second experiment examined the application of the command system in active reading tasks. The results show promise for seamless integration of paper and computers in active reading for their combined affordances. In addition, our study identifies some key design issues, such as the pen form factor and feedback of gestures. This article contributes to better understanding on pros and cons of paper and computers, and sheds light on the design of future interfaces for document interaction.

This paper reports on ongoing investigations into the use and role of paper mail communications in domestic environments. It utilises ethnographically informed data to analyse how paper mail supports various social roles within the home, particularly a division of labour whereby women tend to be largely responsible for what may be called ‘managing the home’. Implications for the future of paper mail are considered and suggestions made about how e-mail tools may be designed to reflect the patterns of social organisation within the home.

Modern design embraces digital augmentation, especially in the interplay of digital media content and the physical dispersion and handling of information. Based on the observation that small paper memos with sticky backs (such as Post-Its™) are a powerful and frequently used design tool, we have created Post-Bits, a new interface device with a physical embodiment that can be handled as naturally as paper sticky notes by designers, yet add digital information affordances as well. A Post-Bit is a design prototype of a small electronic paper device for handling multimedia content, with interaction control and display in one thin flexible sheet. Tangible properties of paper such as flipping, flexing, scattering, and rubbing are mapped to controlling aspects of the multimedia content such as scrubbing, sorting, or up- or downloading dynamic media (images, video, text). In this paper we discuss both the design process involved in building a prototype of a tangible interface using new technologies, and how the use of Post-Bits as a tangible design tool can impact two common design tasks: design ideation or brainstorming, and storyboarding for interactive systems or devices.