Interactive 3D Representation of Business Case Studies in the Classroom

Abstract

Aim/PurposeIn our previous paper, we have proposed a methodology to deliver an applied business course to the multicultural audience having in mind embedding into the course cultural sensitivity and create a safe place for multicultural students to use own cultural metaphors in a learning place. We have proposed a fusion of ancient storytelling tradition creating an overall context for the teaching process and specific use of rich picture coming from Soft System Methodology (SSM). The used teaching approach is promising and brings the required results. However, the proposed method, to be fully effective requires a computerized supporting tool in a form of sophisticated graphical editor/presentation application displaying in real-time case study progress along with the in-class discussion. This tool is a central topic for this paper. BackgroundThe existing tools like for example MS PowerPoint, MS Visio, or Prezi used by us so far cannot be used for our purpose as the interactive image update distract the students. The MS PowerPoint and Prezi require visible mode switching between design mode (edit) and presentation mode. Whereas MS Visio editing is too slow for our purposes. This switching or editing time create a meaningful distraction during the discussion. MethodologyAs a solution for the above problem, the authors work on the development of own specialized tool using open source software Blender 3D (http://blender.org) along with Python. The code will be released to open source domain to enable further co-operation with other researchers. ContributionThe described effort, if successful, should create a new presentation tool allowing among the other features, seamless in-class knowledge transfer and in the future will enable the way for gamification of case studies.Interactive 3D Representation of Business Case Studies 66 Impact on Society A definite improvement of teaching quality in applied business (however, not limited to) with further possibility to extend to deliver courses e.g. for company's executives. The tool and methodology allow embedding cultural sensitivity into the learning process and will have an impact on digital inclusiveness. Future ResearchThe tool enables possibility for further analysis of the business situation by artificial intelligence interface. In fact, a whole interactive process of reaching the case conclusion may be observed (allowing collecting analytics and insights on teacher and student's behavior and performance).