MATCh: Project Progression of ELTE team II period

MATCh project Schedule of ELTE TeaM (1998-1999 January)

table

Indirect Evaluation (ie):

ie1 Developing Evaluation Methods

We have been engaged in researching and developing evaluation methods for educational multimedia products in the past period in order to come forth with proper procedures to use at the evaluation phase of MATCh tools and applications. We have been testing the method in our course "Evaluation of educational programs" for informatics teachers through one semester (February-June 1998) and have reassured ourselves about the validity of the procedure, which we have configured to suit each software investigated. We have produced a methodology and schedule for evaluation of MATCh tools[1] and have performed a multilevel evaluation on MATCh tools and applications[2].

ie2 Comparison of Similar Products

Some of the products under investigation in the course mentioned above were chosen to be valid as comparison to MATCh tools: "KIDPIX", "Kid Works II", "Storybook Weaver", ... etc., which are similar products designed for the same age group (8-12), giving similar tools as those aimed in MATCh. An extensive comparison of these products available gave us an insight to the market value, needs and demands, available tools, their virtues and flaws, providing clues to the chances, needs and flaws of the MATCh product [2 See Appendix F].

ie3 Investigating the communicative power of story authoring

In order to investigate the possibilities, modes and forms of communication between children with different mother tongues, we have launched a Web project hoping to come up with findings that would be very useful in developing proper Web pages for MATCh networking. Since the MATCh environment was still under development, we have relied on the human side of networking possibilities via Comenius Logo [3], which is the core of MATCh tools. A series of easy to use programs have been developed that facilitate the creation of static and dynamic presentations by children using them with their own version of Comenius Logo, which are sort of emulations of simplified beginner MATCh tools (See Comenius Logo Web pages).

ie4 Evaluation of Possible Educational Use

We intended to investigate: what possible activities could be aided by the development of MATCh tools and the type of applications that would best serve these purposes. For this reason we have held intensive activities with children in Kincskereso school, involving visual arts teachers. We attempted to investigate several activities using traditional tools at this stage, that would be later facilitated by MATCh tools[2 See Appendix A].

Direct Evaluations (de):

de1 Formative Evaluation

We have conducted 5-6 Formative evaluations, depending on the timing of a new release of the tools available. Since the target age group is very young, and the tools were not that stable for use, we have decided to conduct the formative phase with several trials on student teachers, and at each major change a formative evaluation with a few children coming to our university for shorter trial periods. Each of these trials ended with a report on problematic points that were immediately sent to partners for evaluation and modification [2 See Appendix B].

de2 Summative Evaluation

Since the target age is very young, and the tools were not so stable for use, we have decided to conduct the first phase of summative evaluation with informatics student teachers taking part in our course "Designing Multimedia Environments". We have also conducted classes using MATCh tools at Kis János Altabornagy School. We planned the longitudinal evaluation on the educational context of MATCh usage and application development concentrating on our Story Steering application "Lino Liner" [2 See Appendix C].

de3 Contextual Evaluation with respect to educational values

The analysis of the above indirect and direct evaluations resulted in the synthesis of educational values related to the examined editors, "Lino Liner" application, and the resulted works of children [2 See Appendix D and E].

Application development (ad):

ad1 Developing "Story Steering" application

Our proposal was to develop a "Story steering" application, an educationally acceptable application for visual education. The application is a story microworld that is developed in a way to motivate children’s’ involvement in changing the story and developing further constructions. During the process of plan and development, we made extensive research on visual education, and in-depth investigation on how to approach developing animations by children. We produced a complete script for our Story in English [4] and in Hungarian as well and developed animations with the help of a professional animator graphical artist. We scanned through the Hungarian National Curriculum to find possible spots where MATCh tools together with our devised activities could be integrated [5].

ad2 Designing MATCh Web pages

One of the main issues of the MATCh project is to facilitate communication between children of European countries via the help of multimedia tools in the process of creating ideas, views, games and other information for transmission. We planned to design a series of Web pages that would allow children to deliver their messages to peers both locally and internationally, during which they can learn about the other country’s culture and develop means of communication both verbal and non verbal, with multimedia tools. The design issues and considerations have been evaluated [6, 3] and a plan presented to partners[4]. Since the consortium has not yet decided as how to proceed with Web issues, we did not continue with the realisation of our plans. But in a later stage we have constructed some Web pages as illustrations of our project.

ad3 Developing educationally meaningful examples

A group of example applications, activities for children and by children have been prepared as a starting material for a future workbook [4]. Some works have been complied as Web pages (See Working with Children).

Conferences and exhibitions:

References

[1] ed. Turcsányi-Szabó, M., Evaluation of MATCh tools and Applications. Progress report of INCO Copernicus MATCh project, 1998 July.

[2] Turcsányi-Szabó, M., ed., Evaluation of MATCh Tools and Applications. Final Report of MATCh 960106 project, 1999.

[3] Abonyi-Tóth A., Ambruszter G., Pluhár Zs., Firle R., Turcsányi-Szabó, M.,Productive ties via Comenius Logo, in Procedings of XV IFIP World Computer Congress, Teleteaching’98, Distance Learning, Training and Education., pp. 47-54., IFIP Publication, Vienna-Budapest, 1998.

[4] ed. Turcsányi-Szabó, M., Developing Applications. Internal report of INCO Copernicus MATCh project, 1998.

[5] Turcsányi-Szabó, M., IMAGINE a Tool to Learn, Express and Explore Stories, Paper submitted and accepted to be presented at COMNed’99 IFIP 3.5 and 3.6 Conference, Aulko, Finland, June 1999.

[6] R. Firle, "Designing motivating Web pages for exchange and activities", Masters dissertation ELTE, 1998.

[7] Abonyi-Tóth A., IMAGINE: Multimédia szerzôi rendszer gyerekeknek (IMAGINE: multimedia authoring tool for children)

[8] Ambruszter G., Oktato szerzoi rendszerek osszehasonlitasa (Comparison of of educational authoring tools)

[9] Turcsányi-Szabó, M, Comenius Logó háló (Comenius Logo Net)

 

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