A common conclusion of several studies is that augmented reality (AR) applications can enhance the learning process, learning motivation and effectiveness. Despite the positive results, more research is necessary. The current work aims to study the degree of diffusion of AR technology and teachers’ opinion about the need for continuous training, the process of creating 3D models, and the feasibility of AR applications development by teachers and students in school settings. Teachers are the common element in every different educational system and play a key role in the integration and acceptance of technology in education. Qualitative research was conducted in February 2019 in rural and suburban areas of North-Western Greece on secondary education teachers of different specialties and the results showed that AR applications development is feasible under certain conditions, including the limitation of the curriculum as the main negative factor and the teacher’s personality and the desire for co-operation among teachers of different specialties as positive factors.
Digital storytelling can offer multiple benefits both to students and teachers, and new media provide multimodal ways to produce, transmit and communicate stories. In parallel, the need to engage preschool children with the creative use of technology emerges in order to address concerns that arise from the modern way of life and the need to safeguard intangible cultural heritage and to communicate its value for sustainable development. The current study presents an example of digital storytelling utilization in a preschool class to raise awareness on sustainability issues. A linear digital storytelling was created, representing a local myth about watermills, then an educational intervention was conducted, where the myth’s digital representation was used as an educational tool to raise awareness on local cultural heritage and sustainability issues and also as an example to inspire and guide teachers and students to create their own stories. Results showed that the digital storytelling was an effective educational tool to the acquisition of new knowledge and the motivation of preschool children’s interest about the cultural asset of watermills and that the production of digital storytelling is feasible in the class context. These findings prove the potential of digital storytelling and mobile technology by using low-cost devices and applying simple techniques in preschool education.
In this paper we propose and study a framework for evaluating Hypermedia Application Development and Management Systems (HADMS) in relation to specific application requirements. We address the need for HADMS capable to efficiently support the main users involved in the life cycle of hypermedia applications, namely designers, programmers/implementers, authors/administrators and end-users. A HADMS consists of a hypermedia application development and management methodology and the respective environment. In this work, we propose and classify a set of evaluation criteria. These are mainly imposed by real life development and the need to support forthcoming, or next generation, features for hypermedia applications. We also introduce a simple framework for a comparative evaluation of HADMS. Furthermore, we demonstrate the use of the criteria and the framework proposed, for the case of three real-life applications. A representative set of seven HADMS is selected and the evaluation of these systems is carried out, leading to some useful conclusions and suggestions for future work.
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