The Embodied cognition theory is a position in cognitive science stating that intelligent behaviour emerges from the interplay between brain, body and world. The position is one I agree with and it is rather an extension to the theoretical approaches based on constructivist principles. The most interesting concept I read about this week was with the idea of presence in VLE. Presence is the belief that you are “in” the artificial environment, not in the laboratory or classroom interacting with a computer. Typically, during a visit to an artificial environment, attention is divided between the environment created at the computer interface, be it a computer screen of virtual reality helmet, and the environment outside, which might be noisy, or contain someone giving you instructions about what to do, or be distracting in other ways. (Winn, 2003) When thinking about the concept of presence I thought back to my days learning about abstract geometry, planes, rotations and reflections. I can remember that I would often close my eyes and leave my desk in a sense to visualize the problem in my mind. In this way my mind had the ability to create a virtual environment and I was able to solve problems within this environment. I started to think that this ability to establish presence differs from person to person and could be a determining factor in ones aptitude with mathematics. It was this thought that piqued my interest in reading more about VR.
The first article I read looked promising however after reading it in depth I felt I didn’t see much practical information. The article presents SMILE™ (Science and Math in an Immersive Learning Environment) an immersive game in which deaf and hearing children ages 5-10 learn math and science concepts and ASL (American Sign Language) terminology through interaction with animated 3D characters and objects. The paper was entirely focused on the research behind the design of the software and the specifics of how the software will work. I found the research and development of this software to be something promising and look forward to seeing some practical research results with students.
I chose to read a further article exploring the benefits of VLE in particular a study using the environment called Virtual Puget Sound. The overall findings lead to the recommendation that the extra cost of immersion with VR only pays off when the content to learn is complex, three-dimensional and dynamic, and when the student does not need to communicate with “the outside” while working. (Winn, Windschitl, Fruland & Lee, 2002)
In “The missing bodies of mathematical thinking and learning have been found” (Stevens, 2012), they made a strong case to include the body as an integrated part in determining mathematical concepts and processes. The evidence presented in this article makes it very difficult to consign the body to the sidelines of mathematical cognition if our goal is to make sense of how people make sense and take action with mathematical ideas, tools, and forms.
References:
Adamo-Villani, N. & Wilbur, R. (2007). An immersive game for k-5 math and science. Proceedings of the I1th International Conference Information Visualization, 921-924.
Stevens, R. (2012). The missing bodies of mathematical thinking and learning have been found. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 21(2), 337-346.
Winn, W. (2003). Learning in artificial environments: Embodiment, embeddedness, and dynamic adaptation. Technology, Instruction, Cognition and Learning, 1(1), 87-114
Winn, W., Windschitl, M., Fruland, R., & Lee, Y. (2002). When does immersion in a virtual environment help students construct understanding? Proceedings of the International Conference of the Learning Sciences, Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.