The Jasper Project

The Jasper Experiment, popular in the early 1900’s was a video-based learning tool that I would argue was a precursor to many of the educational goals of today.  The Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt University (1993) describes the experience of a child being immersed into a video and is asked to identify and create goals and subgoals to ultimately solve a presented problem.  The goal of this learning experience is to “[emphasize] the importance of anchoring or situated instruction in meaningful, problem-solving context” and create classroom activities that are complex, have open-ended problem solving that connect math to other subjects and to the world outside the classroom (475, The Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt University, 1993).

Like many research findings, I often question that reliability of the findings as the participants are typically in a central location.  What I found very interesting about the readings this week was the article titled Using video-based anchored instruction to enhance learning: Taiwan’s experience (2000).  They describe a culture that is strict on academics and typically follows the traditional, teacher-centered, memorization educational format.  Using videos inspired by the Jasper series, students in Taiwan were placed into a treatment or control group.  The findings ultimately appeared to be similar to that of American findings.  They found that students felt more positive, interested in and less anxious towards mathematics.  As well, student problem-solving skills improved significantly with anchored instruction.

These findings ultimately had me wondering, what was it about these videos that worked so well?  Although the readings this week discussed some of their explanations for the effectiveness (video formatting, narrative, generative format, embedded data, problem complexity, pairs of adventures and links to curriculum), they were also written over 20 years ago.  What about students today, would they feel the same connection to the videos?  My answer is yes.  As a teacher at an inner city school I am constantly looking for material that is accessible to my students.  Many of my students are reading below grade level and when presented with written instructions become overwhelmed and shut down.  I appreciate the video aspect of this tool as it provides the information in a format that I know each of my students will understand and be drawn to.  Our ultimate goal is to motivate students and make them excited to learn, and I believe a tool like this would do just that.

Finally, I appreciated the discussion of assessment described by The Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt University (1992).  They found that student and teacher perceptions of the assessment tools originally associated with the videos was creating a negative impact on the students.  I was also confused myself.  Here is a fantastic tool that has been created to increase student motivation and demonstrate to them the real-world implications of mathematics,  but yet we will require them to use paper-to-pencil summative assessment.  In other words, it would seem that the purpose of the videos was once again to have students ready for another test.  As a way to solve this concern, the researchers piloted a teleconference that had students watching videos and using descriptive, problem-solving answers to identify an expert.  It ultimately had students feeling that they were learning something new and reengaged in the material.

Overall, I believe the Jasper Project is a great example of educational tools and technology that successfully implements content and technology in a way that would engage and motivate our students.

Shayla

The Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt University (1992), The Jasper Series as an Example of Anchored Instruction: theory, program, description, and assessment data. Educational Psychologist, 27(3), 291-315.

The Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt University (1993), The Jasper Experiment: using video to furnish real-world problem solving. The Arithmetic Teacher 40(8), 474-478.

Shyu, H. (2000), Using video-based anchored instruction to enhance learning: Taiwan’s experience. British Journal of Educational Technology, 31(1), 57-69.