DIP: BioSim: Developing a Wearable Toolkit for Teaching Complex Science Through Embodied Play

在这个网络学习：转变教育DIP（发展和实施）项目中，pi的重点是更好地促进小学早期（K-3年级）的科学学习。他们专注于生命科学学科，特别关注复杂的生物系统。学习复杂系统的方法是通过可穿戴计算机增强的参与式模拟。孩子们在复杂的生物系统中扮演代理的角色（例如，蜜蜂采集蜂蜜，捕食者和猎物），在他们可以戴在一只手上的电子木偶的帮助下，他们观察他们所模拟的动物特征的变化（例如，能量，饥饿，口渴，需要睡眠），因为他们在环境中以这些动物的方式相互作用。研究的重点是学习如何在第一人称参与模拟系统的情况下发生，以及如何最好地促进学习，如何学习一个复杂系统，如何让孩子们准备好学习其他复杂系统，如何随着时间的推移建立对复杂系统的理解，以及使用技术影响这种学习的最佳方式。目前，人们对如何有效地在小学教授科学知之甚少。为了适合这个年龄段，这些pi采用一种有趣的方式让孩子们（从K到3年级）沉浸在动物和有机体的生活以及他们生活的生态系统中。孩子们参与自然生态系统的模拟，在这些系统中扮演动物或有机体的角色。为了促进对经验的反思，这将导致学习，孩子们配备了电子木偶，帮助他们体验这些动物是如何？生命受其所处环境中动物和植物生命的相互作用影响。

In this Cyberlearning: Transforming Education DIP (Development and Implementation) Project, the PIs focus on better promoting science learning in early elementary school (grades K-3). They focus in the discipline of life sciences, with specific focus on complex biological systems. The approach to learning about complex systems is through participatory simulation augmented by wearable computers. Children act out the roles of agents in complex biological systems (e.g., bees gathering honey, predators and preys) together, and with the help of electronic puppets that they can wear on one hand, they watch changes in the characteristics of animals they are simulating (e.g., energy, hunger, thirst, need for sleep) as they interact in the environment the way those animals would. Research focuses on how learning happens in the context of 1st person participation in a simulated system and how to best facilitate that learning, how learning about one complex system readies children to learn about other complex systems, how the understanding of complex systems builds over time with exposure to a variety of such systems, and best ways of using technology to affect such learning.There is little understanding currently of how to teach science productively in elementary school. As is appropriate for this age group, these PIs take a playful approach to immersing youngsters (in grades K through 3) in the lives of animals and organisms and the ecosystems they live in. Children participate in simulations of natural ecosystems, taking on the roles of animals or organisms in those systems. To promote the kinds of reflection on experience that will lead to learning, children are equipped with electronic puppets that help them experience how those animals? lives are affected by their interactions with animal and plant life in their environment.