EAGER: Making with Understanding

有一种新的文化运动，人们每天都在摆弄STEM（科学、技术、工程、数学）中的概念，仅仅是为了满足创造力和好奇心。这种“创客运动”是由低成本电子产品和制造工具的广泛可用性推动的，这些工具允许业余创客在探索科学现象的同时创造互动对象。这样的环境具有巨大的潜力，可以让人们参与STEM概念和活动，同时使个人能够为复杂和对个人有意义的问题找到创造性的解决方案。然而，在这些学习环境中，学生的关注点往往是完成一个技术项目，而不是理解科学概念。虽然在这种情况下确实会发生一些学习，但创客活动的很大一部分可能包括遵循一系列指示并相信它们将导致一个功能项目。在这个项目中，研究了一种新兴技术，增强现实（AR），通过使学生能够理解具有挑战性的概念，作为改变STEM创客运动的一种手段。创客空间活动涉及许多看不见的现象（例如，电流的流动，磁场的相互作用，或空气压力波的运动）。增强现实头盔，比如微软的Hololens，可以让学生在现实世界中看到虚拟的“全息图”。这个项目调查了设计活动的影响，在设计活动中，学习者可以可视化并与项目中涉及的隐藏力量互动，如电子、磁场、光或无线电波，或者可视化物理组件的内部工作，如微芯片和传感器。本提案探讨了如何通过增强现实技术来增强新一代创客空间，以创造能够理解制作的学习环境。本项目利用增强现实（AR）技术增强学生在创客空间中的传统活动，并调查这种干预是否1)增加了学习收益，2)促进了学生之间更深层次的概念讨论，3)修改了学生对观察到的现象的概念。一个例子包括从零开始制造一个扬声器（放大的电信号被转换成磁场），或者编程一个微控制器来根据多个传感器的读数做出决定。这些活动通过使用AR技术得到增强，因为系统将不可见现象（电子流、磁力、传感器值、代码片段等）直接覆盖在相关物理组件的顶部。研究包括进行系统的实证研究，以比较基于ar的学习与传统的非ar方法的有用性，以及后续研究，以确定协作学习的启示。该项目将采用传统的定量和定性方法，以及多模态学习分析领域的新方法来理解和分类学生在不同条件下的行为。这项工作将有助于我们理解如何通过增强现实等新技术加强STEM概念的学生教育，2)提供一套可重复使用的模块来可视化和模拟在创客活动中经常遇到的不可见现象，以及3)制定指导方针来帮助设计创新的学习环境。

There is a new cultural movement where everyday people tinker with concepts in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics), simply for the purpose of satisfying creativity and curiosity. This "maker movement" is powered by the wide availability of low-cost electronics and manufacturing tools, which allow amateur makers to create interactive objects while exploring scientific phenomena. Such environments have great potential to engage people with STEM concepts and activities while empowering individuals to find creative solutions to complex and personally meaningful issues. However, in these learning environments, frequently students' focus is more on completing a technical project rather than comprehending scientific concepts. While some learning does happen in such contexts, a significant portion of maker activities may include following a list of instructions and trusting that they are going to result into a functional project. In this project an emerging technology, Augmented Reality (AR), is investigated as a means to transform the STEM maker movement by making challenging concepts accessible to students. Many invisible phenomena are involved in maker space activities (e.g., the flow of electricity, the interaction of magnetic fields, or the movement of air pressure waves). Augmented Reality headsets, such as the Microsoft Hololens, allow students to see virtual "holograms" in the physical world. This project investigates the impact of design activities where learners can visualize and interact with the hidden forces involved in their projects, such as electrons, magnetic fields, light or radio waves, or to visualize the inner workings of physical components such as microchips and sensors. This proposal explores how a new generation of maker spaces can be enhanced by augmented reality technologies to create learning environments that enable making with understanding. This project augments traditional student activities in maker spaces using augmented reality (AR) technology, and investigates whether this intervention 1) increases learning gains, 2) facilitates deeper conceptual discussion among students, and 3) modifies student conceptions of the observed phenomena. An example activity includes building a speaker from scratch (in which amplified electrical signals are converted into magnetic fields), or programming a micro-controller to make decisions based on the readings of multiple sensors. Such activities are enhanced by the use of AR technology, as the system overlays a representation the invisible phenomena (flow of electrons, magnetic forces, sensor values, snippets of code, etc.) directly on top of the relevant physical components. Research involves conducting systematic empirical studies to compare the usefulness of AR-based learning vs. traditional non-AR approaches, and follow-up studies to identify the affordances for collaborative learning. The project will employ traditional quantitative and qualitative measures, along with novel methods from the field of multi-modal learning analytics to understand and classify students' behaviors across conditions. This work will 1) contribute to our understanding of how student education of STEM concepts can be enhanced by new technologies such as augmented reality, 2) contribute a set of reusable modules to visualize and simulate the invisible phenomena that are commonly encountered in maker activities, and 3) produce guidelines to help the design of innovative learning environments.