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Although research has touted the value of making in educational settings, scant work has been done in formal school contexts utilizing quantitative methods. This could be attributed to the various challenges in integrating making in school settings. To fill in the gap, this study presents an approach to integrate making into science classes at the 3rd to 5th grade levels in a U.S. public school for four consecutive years (2015–2019). We examined the effect of the program on students' self-beliefs (self-efficacy, motivation, and self-concept) using a longitudinal quasi-experimental design. We also examined the effect of making on students' knowledge and skills using state testing data. Results suggest that when averaged across post school year surveys, students in maker classes (vs. control) reported higher self-efficacy beliefs in science and making as well as more interests in STEM-related careers. Moreover, over two school years, we observed that students in the control group experienced declines on some of our variables while our maker students did not. Data thereby speaks to the potential value and promise of integrating making into formal school settings. Practical implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research aims to investigate the impact of augmented reality (AR) technologies developed within the framework of primary school students' on student achievement, attitudes towards the course, attitudes towards technology, and participation in classroom activities. The contents of AR-based learning materials have been developed by 4th-grade teachers and writers within the context of the existing curriculum. The study process was carried out based on the instructional design model. The research was performed in conjunction with the quasi-experimental design among the experimental designs of quantitative research methods. Using the cluster random sampling method, students in the experimental and control groups were selected among 11 primary schools. The findings indicate that contrary to the students in the control group, the students in the experimental group had higher academic achievement and participation in classroom activities, and also their attitudes to the course and applied technology were more positive. Moreover, concerning the experimental group students, a positive and significant correlation between their academic achievements, attitudes towards the course, attitudes towards technology, and their participation and participation in classroom activities have been observed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent pandemic brought on considerable changes in terms of learning activities, which were moved from in-person classroom-based lessons to virtual work performed at home in most world regions. One of the most considerable challenges faced by educators was keeping students motivated toward learning activities. Interactive learning environments in general, and augmented reality (AR)-based learning environments in particular, are thought to foster emotional and cognitive engagement when used in the classroom. This study aims to compare the motivation and learning outcomes of middle school students in two educational settings: in the classroom and at home. The study involved 55 middle school students using the AR application to practice basic chemistry concepts. The results suggested that students' general motivation towards the activity was similar in both settings. However, students who worked at home reported better satisfaction and attention levels compared with those who worked in the classroom. Additionally, students who worked at home made fewer mistakes and achieved better grades compared with those who worked in the classroom. Overall, the study suggests that AR can be exploited as an effective learning environment for learning the basic principles of chemistry in home settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many children fail to comprehend what they read because they do not monitor their understanding, which requires making accurate judgements of what they know and then employing repair strategies when comprehension fails. Relying on research from learning science and cognitive and developmental psychology, we developed the Word Knowledge e-Book (WKe-Book) to improve children's calibration of their word knowledge, strategy use, and word knowledge overall; skills which are associated with reading comprehension. The WKe-Book, which is read on a tablet computer, is a choose-your-own adventure book where choices require choosing between two rare words (e.g., cogitate vs. procrastinate). Depending on the word chosen, the story follows a different plot. There are also embedded comprehension questions where students receive immediate feedback with consequences for incorrect answers, such as being sent back to reread a few pages. In a randomized controlled trial, we tested whether students (N = 603 in 25 third through fifth grade classrooms in Arizona in the US) reading the WKe-Book would demonstrate improved word knowledge, strategy use, and word knowledge calibration. Classrooms were randomly assigned to read the WKe-Book immediately (treatment) or later (delayed-treatment control), and within classrooms, students were randomly assigned to either participate in a 15-minute weekly book club (book club treatment) or to read the WKe-Book independently with no book club (no book club control). Results revealed a significant treatment effect of the WKe-Book on students' word knowledge, word knowledge calibration, and strategy use, which predicted student performance on standardized reading comprehension and vocabulary measures. The effects were greater for students who participated in weekly book clubs compared to students in the no book club control. These findings suggest that the affordances offered by technology, which are unavailable in paper-based books, can support students' development of metacognition, including word knowledge calibration, strategy use, and word learning skills.

Augmented reality (AR)-based learning environments are argued to foster cognitive and emotional involvement. Immersion has been identified as one of the driving forces that promote learning in technology-based learning environments. This study evaluated the learning effectiveness and immersion appeal of an AR-marker-based learning activity targeted at practicing basic chemistry concepts. Data were collected from a cohort of 124 middle school students in Mexico and analyzed using pretest–posttest comparisons and cluster analysis. The results suggest that students with higher immersive learning profiles achieve better learning outcomes compared with those with lower immersive profiles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent pandemic brought on considerable changes in terms of learning activities, which were moved from in-person classroom-based lessons to virtual work performed at home in most world regions. One of the most considerable challenges faced by educators was keeping students motivated toward learning activities. Interactive learning environments in general, and augmented reality (AR)-based learning environments in particular, are thought to foster emotional and cognitive engagement when used in the classroom. This study aims to compare the motivation and learning outcomes of middle school students in two educational settings: in the classroom and at home. The study involved 55 middle school students using the AR application to practice basic chemistry concepts. The results suggested that students’ general motivation towards the activity was similar in both settings. However, students who worked at home reported better satisfaction and attention levels compared with those who worked in the classroom. Additionally, students who worked at home made fewer mistakes and achieved better grades compared with those who worked in the classroom. Overall, the study suggests that AR can be exploited as an effective learning environment for learning the basic principles of chemistry in home settings.

Augmented reality (AR)-based learning environments are argued to foster cognitive and emotional involvement. Immersion has been identified as one of the driving forces that promote learning in technology-based learning environments. This study evaluated the learning effectiveness and immersion appeal of an AR-marker-based learning activity targeted at practicing basic chemistry concepts. Data were collected from a cohort of 124 middle school students in Mexico and analyzed using pretest–posttest comparisons and cluster analysis. The results suggest that students with higher immersive learning profiles achieve better learning outcomes compared with those with lower immersive profiles.

Augmented reality (AR) has evolved hand in hand with advances in technology, and today is considered as an emerging technique in its own right. The aim of our study was to analyze students' perceptions of how useful AR is in the school environment. A non-experimental quantitative design was used in the form of a questionnaire in which 106 primary sixth-grade students from six schools in the Region of Murcia (Spain) participated. During the study, a teaching proposal using AR related to the content of some curricular areas was put forward in the framework of the 3P learning model. The participants' perceptions of this technique were analyzed according to each variable, both overall and by gender, via a questionnaire of our own making, which had previously been validated by AR experts, analyzing its psychometric qualities. The initial results indicate that this technique is, according to the students, useful for teaching the curriculum. The conclusion is that AR can increase students' motivation and enthusiasm while enhancing teaching and learning at the same time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Training and examining healthcare practitioners' nursing skills by situating them in a contextualized environment to interact with trained simulated patients and making required decisions based on the collected information is a widely adopted approach in nursing training. In a nursing skills course, the flipped learning method shifts the lecture time to the before-class time, allowing more time for teachers' guidance and skills practice in the class. However, if students do not have in-depth understanding in the individual learning space, their learning achievement is often not as expected. In this study, an ASQ (Annotation, Summarizing and Questioning)-based flipped learning strategy for nursing skills training is proposed to engage nurse practitioners (NPs) in deep and effective learning. Moreover, an experiment was conducted to evaluate the effects of the proposed approach on learners' learning achievement, nursing skills, self-efficacy, cognitive load, and critical thinking tendency. The experimental results showed that the approach not only improved NPs' nursing skills, but also significantly increased their self-efficacy and critical thinking tendency. • An ASQ-based flipped learning approach was proposed. • The approach helps students effectively identify key concepts before the class. • An experiment was conducted in a clinical nursing skills training course. • The approach improved the learners' nursing skills performance. • The approach improved the learners' self-efficacy and critical thinking tendency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To situate students in authentic English learning and practicing contexts so as to facilitate their writing performance, in this study, a mind mapping-based contextual gaming approach was proposed. A quasi-experiment was implemented by recruiting two English tourism classes of students from a university of science and technology in northern Taiwan. One class was scheduled to learn with the proposed approach, and the other was arranged to learn with the conventional contextual gaming approach. The students' writing performance, learning perceptions and generative uses were measured to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach. It was found that, compared to the control group students; the experimental group students who learned with the proposed learning approach had better writing performance in the aspects of fluency and elaboration with a small effect size. Additionally, it was found that most students considered the game to be beneficial and interesting, and they were in favor of the mind mapping strategy. Moreover, it was also found that the proposed learning approach is more likely to help students produce positive thoughts and feelings, generate diverse ideas, create a sense of exoticism and express actions or intent of actions. Finally, the limitations of the study and some suggestions for improvement of this proposed gaming learning environment and approaches are provided. • A mind mapping-based contextual gaming approach was proposed. • An experiment was conducted to evaluate the performance of the proposed approach. • The approach has been applied to an English tourism course. • The approach improved the students' writing performance and language use. • Some suggestions for improvement of this proposed approach are provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract There are a large variety of methodologies, contexts and perspectives that have been used to evaluate the use of technology in education. The vast array of literature involving learning technology evaluation makes it challenging to acquire an accurate sense of the different aspects of learning that are evaluated, and the possible approaches that can be used to evaluate them. This study conducted a systematic review of how technology use in education has been evaluated, based on 365 papers published in Computers and Education between 2015 and 2017. The papers analyzed encompassed a diverse range of education levels, disciplines and technologies, that were broadly commensurate with characterizations of the learning technology field from other studies. The analysis found that the evaluation of learning technology use tended to focus on eight themes: learning outcomes, affective elements, behaviors, design, technology elements, pedagogy, presence, and institutional environment. In the majority of studies (66.6%) at least one established instrument was used to evaluate the effectiveness of learning technology usage, however, a wide variety of instruments were observed within sub-themes of evaluation. The 22 instruments used to evaluate an aspect of learning technology usage in more than one study are identified. Evaluation trends for different disciplines, technologies and educational levels are also established. The findings provide an analytical framework that educators and researchers can utilize when evaluating the use of technology in education, and could potentially inform the development of new, more holistic and more robust evaluation methods. Highlights • Eight foci of learning technology evaluations emerged from a systematic review. • The main foci were learning outcomes, affective elements, behaviors and design. • Of the 365 papers analyzed, 66.6% used at least one instrument from a prior study. • The 22 instruments used in multiple studies to evaluate sub-categories are reported. • The results assist learning technology evaluation and characterize the field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract In this study, we systematically reviewed the experimental mobile learning studies published in 2010–2016. Moreover, the activity theory framework was adopted to investigate the insights and trends of mobile learning. That is, the dimensions of context, tools, control, communication, subjects and objectives were employed to analyze the studies. It was found that most experimental mobile learning studies engaged students in real-world contexts, and the activities were conducted based on the existing school curriculums. This means that researchers and school teachers noted the value of situating students in meaningful learning by helping them link what they had learned from the textbooks to real-world scenarios or daily life environments. In the meantime, the studies frequently involved the students in actively using mobile systems with communication facilities to acquire knowledge via interacting with peers, events, and specified real-world learning targets in the environment. On one hand, many researchers proposed to raise students' motivation; on the other hand, they expected to observe more of what the learners, particularly novices and low-achievement students, had done when observing their past interactions. Even so, it was found that mobile devices were considered a main way of allowing students to acquire self-learning materials rather than only mediation learning across contexts. As the current studies can be considered to contain blended rather than purely self-paced learning, there is still a large space for mobile learning progress and development. Highlights • A review on experimental m-learning was done based on the activity theory framework. • The studies published in 2010–2016 were investigated to find the trends of m-learning. • The context, tool, control, communication, subject and objective aspects were analyzed. • The phenomena of the m-learning activities conducted in the studies were reported. • Possible research issues of m-learning in the future were proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, flipped learning has received increasing emphasis; it engages students in deriving basic knowledge through instructional videos before the class, and hence more time is available for practicing, applying knowledge, or student-teacher interaction in class. Many scholars have pointed out that, with such a learning approach, teachers can design more effective in-class activities by guiding students to have higher order thinking as well as interactions with peers and teachers. In the meantime, researchers have also indicated that employing proper educational technologies or learning strategies could further improve students’ performance. Therefore, in this study, an Augmented Reality (AR)-based learning guiding mode is proposed for developing a flipped learning system. To examine the effectiveness of the proposed approach, an experiment was conducted in a natural science learning activity of an elementary school using the developed system. The participants were four classes of 111 fifth graders. Two classes were assigned to the experimental group, while the others were the control group. Those learning in the experimental group used the AR-based flipped learning mode, while those in the control group learned with the conventional flipped learning mode. From the experimental results, it was found that the AR-based flipped learning guiding approach not only benefited the students in terms of promoting their project performance, but also improved their learning motivation, critical thinking tendency, and group self-efficacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emotion regulation (ER) is key for children's development and it has recently been considered in many serious games and e-learning technologies. However, these tools have focused on children's efforts to change their own emotions (intrapersonal ER), overlooking how children may engage in modifying the emotions of others (interpersonal ER). To address this gap, we have developed a multiplatform online serious game, Emodiscovery, which evaluates whether children (8-11 year-olds) tend to use different adaptive and maladaptive regulation strategies to change others' negative emotions with the use of 3D animated characters. The game is organized into levels, each representing a different scenario, where the child is asked to interact with the character three times choosing an appropriate regulation strategy to cheer him or her up from four possible options, being two adaptive and two maladaptive strategies. To test the effectiveness of the game, a sample of English children played three scenarios depicting a character feeling sadness, anger, and fear, respectively. Results showed that most children chose adaptive strategies to improve the character's emotion across the different emotion scenarios. Furthermore, emotion recognition was not positively related to children's choices of regulation strategies. The implications and applications of the games are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study reviewed the literature on mobile technology-supported collaborative learning from 2007 to 2016. Several issues, such as the distributions and research methods, learning devices and learning environments, participants, research issues, application domains, grouping methods and collaborative learning strategies, are addressed. In addition, the relationship between the learning strategies and measurement issues are investigated. The review found that the amount of research on mobile collaborative learning increased and the connection between new mobile technology and collaborative learning activities became tighter. College students received the greatest emphasis, but more focus should be put on junior and elementary school students. Few studies were conducted on teachers and adults. In the most recent five years, the research was focused on improving learners' performance in science, especially social science, and in natural scenarios outside of the classroom, but less emphasis was put on developing learners’ skills and higher order skills. There was little research focusing on different selection methods of group members and the teaching effects of grouping design. Most research adopted conceptualized collaborative learning strategies. Furthermore, some studies proposed that the collaborative learning activities conducted in mobile learning environments should be designed carefully to guide students to experience more effective collaborative constructivist learning. Based on the findings, in-depth discussion and suggestions for future studies are given. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the progress and development of education, teaching by means of computer becomes more and more popular. In this article, a novel virtual simulation system teaching method is presented for numerically controlled engineering training as it helps students acquire the theoretical knowledge, practical skills, and the problem troubleshooting techniques on the usage of numerically controlled machines and programming. The architecture underlying theoretical basis for numerically controlled teaching system based on virtual machining technology is described. Furthermore, we have designed a study to explore the project’s impact on students. The study is based on an experimental approach to evaluate the impact of virtual simulation system teaching on student results during the first year, and then the questionnaire surveys were performed to analyze students’ perception of the impact that virtual simulation system teaching had on the students’ learning efficacy and level of motivation during the development of numerically controlled machining course. The final results show that the proposed teaching system for numerically controlled machining in the paper has been proved effective and feasible in practical application. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A quasi-experimental, pretest-posttest, non-equivalent control group design was used to examine the effect of a mobile gamification application on third and fourth grade students’ Spanish language achievement and student academic self-efficacy. In this study, the treatment group's Spanish language instruction was through the use ofDuolingo®, a computer and mobile app that uses gamification and adaptive learning technology to teach foreign languages. Students in the control group received their regularly scheduled English L1/Spanish L2 class learning activities. The study was 12 weeks in duration. Students were assessed with a 50-question, multiple-choice English to Spanish and Spanish to English pretest covering vocabulary and grammar to control for prior Spanish language achievement. Students were assessed with the Pattern of Adaptive Learning Scales’ (PALS) Academic Efficacy subscale to control for prior academic self-efficacy. The same two instruments were used as posttests. An analysis of covariance showed no significant difference in students’ Spanish achievement or in academic self-efficacy between students who usedDuolingo® and students who were taught with traditional face-to-face instruction. This demonstrates thatDuolingo® is a useful tool for teaching Spanish to elementary students. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Instructional dynamic pictures (animations and videos) contain transient visual information. Consequently, when learning from dynamic pictures, students must process in working memory the current images while trying to remember the images that left the screen. This additional activity in working memory may lead dynamic pictures to be less suitable instructional materials than comparable static pictures, which are more permanent. In order to directly show the influence of transient visual information on dynamic learning environments, we designed a well-matched comparison between a permanent and a transient presentation of an abstract-symbol memory task on the computer. In the task, 104 university students (50% females) had to memorize the type, color, and position of the symbols in a rectangular configuration. In addition, an embodied cognition factor was included where the symbols in the task were either shown with a precision grasping static hand or not. We also assessed how individual characteristics (spatial ability, spatial memory span, and gender) influenced performance. Results showed that (a) permanent outperformed transient presentations, (b) observing hands hindered learning, and (c) high spatial ability and high spatial memory span were beneficial, but gender did not affect performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past decades, the issues related to mobile learning have been widely discussed around the globe; however, the development and trends of applying mobile technologies in nursing education still lack systematic analysis. In this study, a meta review of the studies published in academic journals from 1971 to 2016 was conducted to analyze the application domains, subjects, adopted learning strategies, investigated research issues and findings of mobile technology-supported nursing education. From the review results, it was found that the use of mobile technologies in nursing education and training have made great progress in the past decades. In addition to the changes in mobile technologies and the increasing number of mobile learning studies in nursing education, the subjects and research issues have also become more diverse in recent years. It was also found that mobile learning has mainly been applied to the training of basic nursing concepts and skills as well as to long-term care and obstetrics and gynecology, while few or even no studies are related to other nursing education domains. In addition, several widely adopted mobile learning strategies, such as inquiry-based learning, contextual mobile learning, snychronous sharing, Mindtools, project-based learning and peer assessment, have seldom been adopted in mobile nursing education. This also reflects the fact that most of these studies focused on skills training and basic knowledge comprehension, while few were conducted in the domains aimed at fostering learners' higher order thinking competences, such as problem solving or critical thinking. On the other hand, it was found that the number of studies using an experimental design has increased in recent years; moreover, most studies reported the learners’ cognitive performance and perceptions, while their learning behaviors were seldom analyzed. Accordingly, the research trends and potential research issues of mobile nursing education are proposed as a reference for researchers, instructors and policy makers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the seven years since the introduction of the tablet (Apple iPad) in 2010, the use of software for smart mobile devices has grown rapidly in popularity and has become a hotly debated issue in the field of education and child development. However, the rise in popularity of mobile applications (apps) mainly addressed to young children is not in line with a corresponding increase in their quality, as there is conflicting evidence about the real value and suitability of educational apps. The purpose of this study was to examine whether self-proclaimed educational apps for Greek preschoolers have been designed in accordance with developmentally appropriate standards to contribute to the social, emotional and cognitive development of children in formal and informal learning environments. The study results were discouraging. The majority of the apps aimed to teach children the basics about numbers and letters. Overall, they were drill-and-practice-style, based on a low level of thinking skills, thereby promoting rote learning, and were unable to contribute to a deeper conceptual understanding of certain concepts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In English language teaching settings, the type of lecture is important since students should be exposed to instantly recognisable linguistic features in the target language through interaction. This quasi-experimental study was designed to compare the effectiveness of PowerPoint presentations (PPP) and conventional lecture/discussion sessions on the pedagogical content knowledge of the student-teachers of English. PPP were used in the experimental group and conventional lecture/discussion sessions were employed in the control group (CG). The findings revealed that the treatment process was effective on both groups, but the CG achieved better in the post-test. Following the treatment process, the efficiency of the applications was also tested by means of a questionnaire. The CG reflected more positive attitudes towards the conventional lecture/discussion in terms of the quality of instructional strategies, academic language use, professional development, professional perception and problem-solving. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this study, whether using Augment Reality (AR)-based learning materials could benefit high school students in the process of Chinese writing was explored, along with the pros and cons of using AR for acquiring Chinese writing skills. In order to reduce the gap between the designers and practitioner teachers, Chinese instructors were invited to co-design the AR-based writing materials to achieve the integration of learners, teachers and educational system technology developers in a collaborative process. The AR-based writing support system was provided to a total of 30 twelfth-grade students who participated in the experiment. The students in the experimental group participated in the writing activity using both AR-based learning material and paper-based supports, while the control group worked with only paper-based writing support materials. The results revealed that the AR techniques helped the intermediate-level students the most in their writing performance of content control, article structure and wording. The students, especially the low-achievers, reflected that the functions of the AR system supported them to start writing the first paragraph more quickly, and enriched their ideas. A possible mode for integrating AR techniques in writing courses is proposed. This paper could serve as a reference for educators and learning technology researchers who wish to design AR-guided writing learning materials or courses with the goal of encouraging learners to experience the writing process in a variety of settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using robotics technologies in education is increasingly common and has the potential to impact students' learning. Educational robotics is a valuable tool for developing students' cognitive and social skills, and it has greatly attracted the interest of teachers and researchers alike, from pre-school to university. The purpose of this study is to understand the behavioral patterns of elementary students and teachers in one-to-one robotics instruction process. The participants were made up of 18 elementary school students and 18 preservice teachers. Quantitative content analysis and lag sequential analysis were used to analyze the student-teacher interactions. According to findings, the students' assembling bricks, sharing ideas and experiences, and the teachers' providing guidance and asking questions were the most frequent behaviors. Regarding behavioral sequences, the teachers' guidance significantly followed the students' behavior of expressing and sharing their ideas that followed the teachers’ questions. The students also significantly tended to play with robots that they themselves designed. Moreover, the teacher-student interactions were discussed in detail in terms of gender differences and difficulty level of robotics activities. The results of this study can be taken into consideration in the design of learning environments with robotics activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Even as mobile devices have become increasingly powerful and popular among learners and instructors alike, research involving their comprehensive integration into educational laboratory activities remains largely unexplored. This paper discusses efforts to integrate vision-based measurement and control, augmented reality (AR), and multi-touch interaction on mobile devices in the development of Mixed-Reality Learning Environments (MRLE) that enhance interactions with laboratory test-beds for science and engineering education. A learner points her device at a laboratory test-bed fitted with visual markers while a mobile application supplies a live view of the experiment augmented with interactive media that aid in the visualization of concepts and promote learner engagement. As the learner manipulates the augmented media, her gestures are mapped to commands that alter the behavior of the test-bed on the fly. Running in the background of the mobile application are algorithms performing vision-based estimation and wireless control of the test-bed. In this way, the sensing, storage, computation, and communication (SSCC) capabilities of mobile devices are leveraged to relieve the need for laboratory-grade equipment, improving the cost-effectiveness and portability of platforms to conduct hands-on laboratories. We hypothesize that students using the MRLE platform demonstrate improvement in their knowledge of dynamic systems and control concepts and have generally favorable experiences using the platform. To validate the hypotheses concerning the educational effectiveness and user experience of the MRLEs, an evaluation was conducted with two classes of undergraduate students using an illustrative platform incorporating a tablet computer and motor test-bed to teach concepts of dynamic systems and control. Results of the evaluation validate the hypotheses. The benefits and drawbacks of the MRLEs observed throughout the study are discussed with respect to the traditional hands-on, virtual, and remote laboratory formats. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Analects of Confucius is an important course in the curriculum of Asian Studies in the Chinese community and around the world. Students have to learn a collection of the thoughts of Confucius which have shaped world history and the soul of China. However, educators have indicated that most students fail to understand its abstract thoughts, or even realize its spirit in their daily life experience. Meanwhile, with the advancements of technology, learning with computer games is currently a rapidly developing area of interest for researchers, teachers, material writers and application developers in the educational field. Several studies have shown that by properly incorporating learning contents into game scenarios, an experiential game-based learning approach might foster students' motivation to learn through experience. In addition, the experiential game-based approach is a learning method with great potential for motivating students and stimulating their willingness to engage in continuous and constant learning. Thus, in this study, an experiential digital game has been developed and presented to a fifth grade class learning the Analects of Confucius at an elementary school in Taipei city. An experiment was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach by situating the experimental group in an experiential game-based learning scenario, while the control group learned with a conventional technology-enhanced learning system. The experimental results showed that the proposed approach effectively enhanced the students' learning effects in terms of their learning motivation, deep learning strategy and acceptance of the technology. As a consequence, it is concluded that an experiential digital game-based learning approach can help students understand the conception and meaning of learning, which is important for them to become life-long learners with positive learning attitudes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a 10-year review study that focuses on the investigation of the use of Digital Card Games (DCGs) as learning tools in education. Specific search terms keyed into 10 large scientific electronic databases identified 50 papers referring to the use of non-commercial DCGs in education during the last decade (2003–2013). The findings revealed that the DCGs reported in the reviewed papers: (a) were used for the learning of diverse subject disciplines across all educational levels and leaning towards the school curriculum, in two ways: game-construction and game-play, (b) were mainly proposed by their designers as meaningful, familiar and appealing learning contexts, in order to motivate and engage players/students and also to promote social, rich and constructivist educational experiences while at the same time integrating modern technologies and innovative gamed-based approaches, (c) were implemented using a plethora of digital tools, (d) mainly adopted social and constructivist views of learning during their design and use, although the views were explicitly reported in only a few of these, (e) were evaluated – in more than half of the studies – with positive results in terms of: student learning, attitudes towards DCGs and enrichment of social interaction and collaboration, (f) appeared to support students to acquire essential thinking skills through DCG-play. However, despite the rich DCG-game experiences reported in the reviewed papers, some essential but under-researched topics were also specified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mathematics education in contemporary elementary schools is mainly conducted in a conventional way by giving lectures. A teacher would pass on knowledge to students by giving lectures, and this type of one-way teaching method is prone to cause poor learning achievement. Many researchers have suggested the use of a collaborative problem solving to improve the situation. This research proposed the use of a digital pen learning system (DPLS) with collaborative problem solving to improve learning achievement and learning motivation in a conventional mathematics courses. A quasi-experimental design was adopted to set up all of the teaching activities, which involved 64 fourth-grade students for four weeks. The results of the research show that the learning achievement of the two experimental groups was significantly better than control group. There was no significant difference between the two experimental groups and control group in terms of learning motivation. There was no significant difference between the three groups in terms of learning attitude. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars have indicated the importance of considering anxiety in language learning. They have also pointed out the potential of integrating learning content into gaming contexts. However, few have explored in-depth the learning processes in game-based learning environments while also taking students' learning anxiety into account. To address this issue, a problem-based English listening game was developed, and 77 ninth graders took part in the study by playing the game. A quasi-experiment was conducted to evaluate students' learning achievement, learning motivation and English anxiety. In addition, progressive sequential analysis was employed to explore the learning behavioral patterns of students with different levels of English anxiety. According to the three learning phases, it was found that the gaming approach benefited the students' learning achievement and motivation. Moreover, the students with higher levels of English anxiety progressively performed more complex learning and gaming behaviors in the gaming context, and had better learning achievement than those with lower levels of anxiety. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Situating learners in a context relevant to scientific phenomena enables them to acquire knowledge through experience, reflection, conceptualization, and practice, which is an important learning mode in science education. However, learners generally do not have opportunities to experience many scientific phenomena in the real world. Therefore, virtual learning environments (VLE) are becoming a frequently adopted technology to provide authentic learning contexts. In particular, spherical video-based learning environments (SVLE), which are a low-tech form of VLE, have attracted the attention of school teachers and educational technology researchers. Additionally, effective assessment methods, such as the two-tier-test, have been adopted to examine learners' performance during the virtual learning process. On the other hand, researchers have pointed out that lack of effective learning strategies may decrease the learning effects in a virtual learning context. Hence, this study integrated a graphic organizer into a two-tier test-based learning mode, in which the first-tier questions were declarative items with a short answer (e.g., the questions of where, what, and when), whereas the second-tier questions were more in-depth, deeper causal-type questions (e.g., the questions of why and how), in the contexts of SVLE. To verify the effectiveness of this learning approach, a graphic organizer-based two-tier test SVLE was developed; moreover, a quasi-experimental design was conducted in the "Mysteries of the Earth" unit of the sixth graders' natural science course. A total of 41 sixth graders from two classes, with an average age of 12, were recruited in this experiment. One class was assigned to be the experimental group adopting the graphic organizer-based two-tier test SVLE (GT-SVLE), while the other was the control group adopting the conventional two-tier test-based SVLE (CT-SVLE). All of the students learned with the SVLE using tablet computers. Based on the results, the GT-SVLE could better improve students' learning achievement than the CT-SVLE. Besides, according to behavioral analysis and interviews, the control group had significantly more learning behaviors of repeated reading of supplementary materials and repeated wrong answers, indicating that the proposed approach facilitated students' positive behaviors through observation and knowledge construction in SVLE, which helped them achieve the learning objectives. • A spherical video-based learning environments (SVLE) learning approach is proposed. • The approach advanced students' positive behaviors through observation and knowledge. • The approach was conducted with two-tier test strategy. • The study was conducted in the unit of the sixth graders' natural science course. • The study used concept map as a tool for researching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rate of technological development across the globe is dramatic. The decreasing cost and increasing availability of ICT devices means that its users are no longer exclusively industry or government employees – they are now also home users. Home users integrate ICT in their daily lives for education, socialising and information gathering. However, using ICT is associated with risks and threats, such as identity theft and phishing scams. Most home users of ICT do not have the necessary information technology and Internet skills to protect themselves and their information. School learners, in particular, are not sufficiently educated on how to use technological devices safely, especially in developing countries such as South Africa. The national school curriculum in South Africa currently does not make provision for cyber-safety education, and the availability of supporting material and training for ICT teachers in South Africa is limited, resulting in a lack of knowledge and skills regarding cyber-safety. The research in hand focuses on the situation concerning cyber-safety awareness in schools and has adopted a short-term approach towards cyber-safety among teachers and school learners in South Africa until a formal long-term national approach has been implemented. This study takes a quantitative approach to investigating the current options of teachers to enhance cyber-safety among learners in their schools. The research proposes that short-term initiatives (i.e. posters) can increase learners’ awareness of cyber-safety until formal cyber-safety awareness methods have been introduced.

The flipped classroom is a well-recognized learning mode that enables effective practice and interactions among teachers and students in the class by switching the in-class instructional time and out-of-class practicing time. However, owing to their lack of self-regulated competence, most students might fail to browse and comprehend the instructional materials out of class by themselves. In this paper, a self-regulated flipped classroom approach is proposed to help students schedule their out-of-class time to effectively read and comprehend the learning content before class, such that they are capable of interacting with their peers and teachers in class for in-depth discussions. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach, a quasi-experimental design was employed in an elementary school Mathematics course. The experimental group students learned with the self-regulated flipped classroom approach, while the control group students learned with the conventional flipped classroom approach. The study was conducted using a quantitative approach. The instruments used were a performance test, and questionnaires of self-efficacy and self-regulation. The experimental results indicated that the post-test score of the experimental group was significantly higher than that of the control group. It was also found that the higher self-regulation students showed significantly different learning achievements when learning with different approaches, while there was no significant difference between lower self-regulation students with the different learning approaches. Moreover, the experimental group showed significantly higher self-efficacy than the control group. In addition, the learning log analysis results further showed that, conforming to the objective of the self-regulated strategy, the students would determine the goals for the next learning phase based on their current performance. To sum up, the findings of this study indicate that integrating the self-regulated strategy into flipped learning can improve students’ self-efficacy as well as their strategies of planning and using study time, and hence they can learn effectively and have better learning achievements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Elo rating system was originally developed for rating chess players, nowadays it is widely used for ranking players of many other games. The system can be used in educational systems when we interpret student's answer to an item as a match between the student and the item. In this way we can easily dynamically estimate the skill of students and difficulty of items. We provide a systematic overview of different variants of the Elo rating system and their application in education. We compare the Elo rating system to alternative methods and describe a specific case study (an adaptive practice of geography facts) to illustrate the application of the Elo rating system in education. We argue that the Elo rating system is simple, robust, and effective and thus suitable for use in the development of adaptive educational systems. We provide specific guidelines for such applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An antagonistic relationship is traditionally seen as existing between eco-education and technology, with conventional instructional approaches usually characterized by a commentator guiding students in field learning. Unfortunately, in this passive learning approach, the discovery of rich ecological resources in eco-environments to stimulate positive emotions and experiences is often condensed into a “sightseeing”. Therefore, precise and systematic guidance focused on providing a rich learning experience is needed in field learning and eco-education. Based on Kolb's experiential learning theory, the current study develops an eco-discovery AR-based learning model (EDALM) which is implemented in an eco-discovery AR-based learning system (EDALS). In a field experiment at a botanical garden, 21 middle school students constitute three groups participated in a learning activity using different learning types and media. Quantitative results indicate that, compared to the human-guidance-only model, EDALS successfully stimulates positive emotions and improved learning outcomes among learners. In post-activity interviews, students indicated they found the exploration mode provided by the proposed system to be more interesting and helpful to their learning in school. The use of attractive technologies increase students' willingness not only to learn more about the environment, but also to develop a more positive emotional attachment to it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study was to examine the usefulness of 3D multi-user virtual environments (MUVEs) for freshmen orientation purposes. To do so, a virtual orientation environment was developed on the Active Worlds MUVE. The study sample included 55 students who were enrolled in a university department. The study has a quasi-experimental control group design. The orientation was carried out a week before the academic semester. The virtual departmental orientation was conducted with 25 participants in the 3D MUVE, while the authentic departmental orientation was conducted with 30 participants who were led through the department by a guide. Both groups were administered a Conceptual Knowledge Test before and after their orientations along with a Spatial Knowledge Inventory and an Orientation Evaluation Questionnaire after the interventions. In addition, the Presence Questionnaire in Virtual Environments was administered to the virtual orientation participants. While the conceptual knowledge posttest scores of experimental and control groups increased significantly, there was no significant difference between them. It was found that students in the virtual orientation recalled spatial route details better than the participants in the authentic orientation, while there was no significant difference between the groups in terms of spatial landmark details and overall spatial scores. When the groups were compared in terms of evaluation factors, significant differences were observed in the effect on general learning and simplicity in favor of the virtual orientation, while there were no significant differences in perceived usefulness and enjoyment. Participants perceived a high level of presence in the virtual orientation. There was a small positive correlation between presence and conceptual knowledge and a moderate positive correlation between presence and spatial knowledge. Decreasing distraction factors in the virtual environment had a positive influence on students' conceptual and spatial learning. In general, the virtual orientation has similar or better results than authentic orientation in terms of the variables examined in this study. These findings demonstrate that 3D MUVEs can be effectively used by freshmen students for orientation purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Video games possess many unique features that facilitate learning. Meanwhile, teaching about evolution is never an easy task due to the existence of some barriers to its learning. Virtual Age , therefore, has been developed in an attempt to harness the power of gaming to increase student understanding of biological evolution. The aim of this study was to examine whether Virtual Age is effective for learning about evolution and to further explore the interplay of student concept learning, gaming performance, and in-game behaviors. A total of 62 7th graders took part in the study, and significant findings were revealed. The students did learn by playing Virtual Age , and their long-term knowledge retention was promising. The in-game behaviors, such as times and duration of viewing the relevant information embedded in Virtual Age , were significantly related to gaming performance (game score), which subsequently influenced learning outcomes. Moreover, the results of cluster analysis indicated that three clusters of low learning outcomes/low gaming performance, high learning outcomes, and high gaming performance emerged. Overall, Virtual Age is an effective game for learning about evolution based on its sound and sophisticated design. Implications derived from the study and suggestions for future work are proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Culture right have become a newly emerging human rights around the world after 1980. From a long term perspective of culture protection, it is very important to focus on culture propagation and preservation. Under the erosion of mainstream culture, the preservation issue of aboriginal culture has become a particular important issue. For the sake, this study explores how information technology can be used to effectively help preserve, promote and revitalize traditional Formosan aboriginal cultures through the implementation of digital archives, which can make a culture to be more readily accessible to the general public. To have a better understand about what factors prompt users to continually access the digital culture archive. This paper first presents an adaptation of ‘Web 2.0’ to build a digital archive for the Atayal Culture Museum in Taiwan. Then, explores correlations between constructs such as Web 2.0 site characteristics, media richness, para-social presence, user experience, user satisfaction and user intention. The results could be useful in developing integrated platforms or tools for educational purposes, allowing teachers and students to effectively share and apply cultural and educational resources. Another objective is to revitalize and commercialize the cultural industry, using the digital archive's content as the basis for collaboration with teachers and other relevant professionals to achieve maximum creativity and create practical and innovative digital learning products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inclusive education has occupied a central role in educational planning especially over the last two decades of the 20th century. This article presents an evaluation of the virtual learning object (LO) Incluir—a digital resource designed to support learning. It was created to work as a complementary tool for teacher education that aimed at promoting reflection on inclusion and resignification of teachers' practice. We present some aspects of inclusive education in Brazil and our perspective on teacher education for inclusion. Then we explore the learning object, the pedagogical framework that guided its conception, and the survey that we conducted designed to evaluate the object in its technical and pedagogical aspects. A total of 163 participants answered a questionnaire comprised of 20 closed questions and 3 open-ended questions. Simple descriptive statistics allowed us to determine that participants rated the object very positively. Thematic content analysis was used to organize the qualitative data of the two open-ended questions in three analytical categories. Simple quantification and description was used to analyze the third open-ended question. We concluded that the LO is a valuable complementary resource that contributes to teacher education for inclusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the popularity of embedded systems and the consequently rising demand in the job market for professionals well-versed in them, embedded operating systems (EOSs) have become one of the core courses in computer science studies across the world. The objective of EOS courses is to develop students' ability to port, modify, and customize an embedded operating system through a series of laboratory exercises. However, our teaching experience has revealed that beginners require a considerable amount of time to familiarize themselves with the development environment and the relevant processes, such as operating in a command line interface, setting environment variables, and kernel configurations. Furthermore, students need to constantly handle compiler error messages, malfunctions of the target EOS, and incompatibility issues related to development tools. These problems may frustrate and discourage students. A common strategy to address this problem is to dedicate more hours to teaching or to hire more teaching assistants to help students progress. However, none of these methods is suitable for institutions with limited resources. Therefore, in this paper, we develop a computer-assisted learning system called the Computer-assisted Learning Environment (CALEE) to assist students with their assignments and thus motivate them. CALEE consists of two parts: a self-learning assistant (SLAT) and a collaborative learning website (CLW). SLAT is a software application that provides a set of useful functions to help students perform EOS laboratory exercises, whereas the collaborative learning website seeks to encourage greater interaction among students. Our experiments show that CALEE expedites learning, improves students' motivation, and reduces the teaching load. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Personalized feedback tools in learning is a powerful method that expert applies when helping students to optimize their learning. We propose a new educational framework to optimize the continuous evaluation process for large groups. In our system, a computer provides tests to the mobile devices of the students; they then return the answers to be corrected. The framework provides real-time knowledge about the progress of the class to the teacher and real-time feedback to the students, increasing the rate of student success. Our low-cost implementation makes it unnecessary to incorporate additional resources or to modify the infrastructure. We have tested it in several courses and conferences. We conclude with an evaluation and a discussion from different stakeholders perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Personalization and intelligent tutor are two key factors in the research on learning environment. Intelligent tutoring system (ITS), which can imitate the human teachers' actions to implement one-to-one personalized teaching to some extent, is an effective tool for training the ability of problem solving. This research firstly discusses the concepts and methods of designing problem solving oriented ITS, and then develops the current iTutor based on the extended model of ITS. At last, the research adopts a quasi-experimental design to investigate the effectiveness of iTutor in skills acquisition. The results indicate that students in iTutor group experience better learning effectiveness than those in the control group. iTutor is found to be effective in improving the learning effectiveness of students with low-level prior knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Geospatial technologies offer access to geospatial information via digital representations, such as digital maps, and tools for interaction with those representations. The question is whether geography lessons with geospatial technologies really contribute to the development of students' geospatial thinking, in particular geospatial relational thinking, as is suggested in the literature about geospatial technologies in secondary education. This paper reports about the outcomes of a quasi-experimental research project, in which a geography lesson series with geospatial technologies was compared with a conventional geography lesson series that had the same content. Although the lesson series covered only three lessons, the data showed that the lesson series with geospatial technologies contributed significantly more to the development of students' geospatial relational thinking than the conventional lesson series. The effect size was ‘medium large’. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: In this study, a prompt-based annotation approach is proposed for developing mobile learning systems for architecture design courses. To evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach, an experiment was conducted by assigning 56 freshmen randomly to an experimental group and a control group. The students in the experimental group adopted the mobile learning approach with a prompt-based annotation strategy, while those in the control group learned with the conventional in-field instruction and annotations. From the experimental results, it was found that the proposed prompt-based annotation strategy not only promoted the students' self-efficacy, but also improved their learning achievements. In the meantime, it is interesting to find that the experimental group students had medium cognitive load during the field trip, while the control group had rather low cognitive load. This implies that the prompt-based annotation approach engaged the students in mobile learning tasks with reasonable challenges and efforts. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

A mobile guide system that integrates art appreciation instruction with augmented reality (AR) was designed as an auxiliary tool for painting appreciation, and the learning performance of three groups of visiting participants was explored: AR-guided, audio-guided, and nonguided (i.e., without carrying auxiliary devices). The participants were 135 college students, and a quasi-experimental research design was employed. Several learning performance factors of the museum visitors aided with different guided modes were evaluated, including their learning effectiveness, flow experience, the amount of time spent focusing on the paintings, behavioral patterns, and attitude of using the guide systems. The results showed that compared to the audio- and nonguided participants, the AR guide effectively enhanced visitors' learning effectiveness, promoted their flow experience, and extended the amount of time the visitors spent focusing on the paintings. In addition, the visitors' behavioral patterns were dependent upon the guided mode that they used; the visitors who were the most engaged in the gallery experience were those who were using the AR guide. Most of the visitors using the mobile AR-guide system elicited positive responses and acceptance attitudes. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Although students could effectively search for web data with proper keywords and select web pages related to the studied core issue, however summarizing or organizing the retrieved information remains a difficult task for them. Concept mapping is known to be an effective knowledge construction tool for helping learners organize important concepts related to a core issue. To address the problem, an integrated concept mapping and web-based problem-solving environment, CM-Quest, has been developed; moreover, an experiment has been conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the approach on students' learning performance, learning satisfaction and cognitive load in an elementary school social studies course. The results show that the concept map-integrated approach can significantly enhance the students' web-based problem-solving performance, although the students showed lower degrees of technology acceptance and learning satisfaction in comparison with the conventional web-based problem-solving approach. Moreover, it is found that the students in the concept mapping group revealed higher cognitive loads than those in the control group, which could be the factor contributing to the lower technology acceptance degree and learning satisfaction. As a consequence, it is concluded that the integrated concept mapping and web-based problem-solving approach is helpful to students in guiding them to learn in a more effective way. On the other hand, it remains an open issue to find a suitable way of integrating concept maps into the learning process without introducing too much extra cognitive load so as to promote students' acceptance degree of using technology for better learning. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Educational researchers have recognized Augmented Reality (AR) as a technology with great potential to impact affective and cognitive learning outcomes. However, very little work has been carried out to substantiate these claims. The purpose of this study was to assess to which extent an AR learning application affects learners' level of enjoyment and learning effectiveness. The study followed an experimental/control group design using the type of the application (AR-based, web-based) as independent variable. 64 high school students were randomly assigned to the experimental or control group to learn the basic principles of electromagnetism. The participants' knowledge acquisition was evaluated by comparing pre- and post-tests. The participants' level overall-state perception on flow was measured with the Flow State Scale and their flow states were monitored throughout the learning activity. Finally, participants' perceptions of benefits and difficulties of using the augmented reality application in this study were qualitatively identified. The results showed that the augmented reality approach was more effective in promoting students' knowledge of electromagnetic concepts and phenomena. The analysis also indicated that the augmented reality application led participants to reach higher flow experience levels than those achieved by users of the web-based application. However, not all the factors seem to have influence on learners' flow state, this study found that they were limited to: concentration, distorted sense of time, sense of control, clearer direct feedback, and autotelic experience. A deeper analysis of the flow process showed that neither of the groups reported being in flow in those tasks that were very easy or too difficult. However, for those tasks that were not perceived as difficult and included visualization clues, the experimental group showed higher levels of flow that the control group. The study suggests that augmented reality can be exploited as an effective learning environment for learning the basic principles of electromagnetism at high school provided that learning designers strike a careful balance between AR support and task difficulty. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This research study aims to identify student's perceptions regarding the use of blogging, the pattern of reflection involved in learning Authoring System through blogging and student's performance in tests based on the reflection's pattern. Sixteen students who registered for the Authoring System subject participated in this study. It was conducted using quantitative approaches, through survey and pre-experimental design of one group post-test type. The instruments used were questionnaire, performance test and blog contents, where tutors and students posted messages and comments on the blog during the course. The results showed that the students' overall perception regarding the educational benefits of writing a blog and reading other students' blogs and comments was positive. Students also moderately agreed that they had difficulties in engaging in the reflection through blogging. It was also found that blogging indirectly improved the students' performance in the test. Through blog content analysis, the dominant type of reflection was monologue. However, the results from the data mining analysis showed that the students used reflective conversation and monologue type of reflection to achieve Grade A in learning Authoring System. It shows that students require deep and critical reflection to perform better in the subject. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Many recent studies have reported the benefits of educational computer games in promoting students' learning motivations. On the other hand, however, the effect of digital game-based learning in improving students' learning performance has been questioned. Several previous studies have reported that without properly integrating learning strategies into gaming scenarios, the effectiveness of educational computer games could be limited, or may be even worse than that of the conventional technology-enhanced learning approach. In this study, a concept map-embedded gaming approach is proposed for developing educational computer games by integrating concept mapping as part of the gaming scenarios to help students organize what they have learned during the game-based learning process. Moreover, a role-playing game has been developed for an elementary school natural science course based on the proposed approach. From the experimental results, it is found that the concept map-embedded gaming approach can significantly improve the students' learning achievement and decrease their cognitive load. Moreover, the students who learned with the proposed approach revealed a significantly higher degree of perceived usefulness than those who learned with the conventional game-based learning approach. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Physical objects and virtual information are used as teaching aids in classrooms everywhere, and until recently, merging these two worlds has been difficult at best. Augmented reality offers the combination of physical and virtual, drawing on the strengths of each. We consider this technology in the realm of the mathematics classroom, and offer theoretical underpinnings for understanding the benefits and limitations of AR learning experiences. The paper presents a framework for understanding AR learning from three perspectives: physical, cognitive, and contextual. On the physical dimension, we argue that physical manipulation affords natural interactions, thus encouraging the creation of embodied representations for educational concepts. On the cognitive dimension, we discuss how spatiotemporal alignment of information through AR experiences can aid student's symbolic understanding by scaffolding the progression of learning, resulting in improved understanding of abstract concepts. Finally, on the contextual dimension, we argue that AR creates possibilities for collaborative learning around virtual content and in non-traditional environments, ultimately facilitating personally meaningful experiences. In the process of discussing these dimensions, we discuss examples from existing AR applications and provide guidelines for future AR learning experiences, while considering the pragmatic and technological concerns facing the widespread implementation of augmented reality inside and outside the classroom. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Museums in Taiwan have developed various digital archives, but few people have visited these digital archives. Therefore, this study designed a digital archaeology game for high school students to play. Based on the concept of “learning for playing” (i.e., players who want to win will study more), the digital archaeology game contest aims at attracting students to visit the natural science digital museum. In the game, researchers (players) reorient the artifacts, structures and architectures through excavation and assemblages to understand the world of natural science based on the saliency-based model. To examine whether this game prompts learners to visit the natural science digital museum to acquire knowledge, 80 students from three high schools were recruited and grouped into 40 pairs to compete against each other. After the contest, questionnaires were collected and analyzed using confirmatory factor analysis with structural equation modeling. The results indicated that the research participants'' gameplay self-efficacy affected their perceived hedonic values and was mediated by the perceived ease of playing the game increased their intention to visit the digital archives of the natural science museum. The implications of this study could be used for promotion of digital archives or other digital museums. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]