Fostering Historical Reasoning and Positive Emotions With Location-Based Augmented Reality and Tour Guide Prompts

• In Event: 41.025 - Learning, Engagement, and Assessment in Technology-Rich Learning Environments

Abstract

Objective: Location-aware mobile augmented reality (AR) promotes learning about the past through the delivery of digital media that is dynamically linked to specific exhibits and artifacts located in different historical and heritage sites using GPS technology. Research on the effectiveness of such AR systems in fostering effective learning is in an early stage, and there is currently a paucity of empirical research with which to inform and guide the design of these systems (Wu et al., 2013).
To address this gap in the literature we developed a novel system of guide prompts and feedback that extend previous work by Harley and colleagues (2016) on comparison-driven historical reasoning prompts. The new experimental methodology drew on the historical reasoning framework (van Drie & van Boxtel, 2008), Krathwohl’s (2002) revision of Bloom’s taxonomy, and research on pedagogical prompts (e.g., Graesser, Person, & Magliano, 1995; Greene & Azevedo, 2009) to foster more active learning, cognitive engagement, and deeper levels of historical reasoning with a mobile AR history app. This study investigated whether the new extended prompt and feedback condition (EPF) supported better learning outcomes than a control condition that used less sophisticated, comparison-driven prompts developed and evaluated by Harley and colleagues (2016). We also evaluated whether students reported higher levels of positive emotions in the new pedagogical prompt condition.
Methods and Results: To evaluate the effectiveness of the EPF condition in comparison to the control condition, 44 undergraduate students were randomly assigned to one condition for their on-site guided tour of a historical location with a location-aware mobile AR app: MTL Urban Museum. In both conditions, the human guide invited learners to identify differences between the past and present versions of the historical location using the MTL Urban Musem app’s multimedia and GPS features. In the control condition, the guide provided learners with additional historical facts about the location’s transformations from past to present after they had identified a historically meaningful difference. In the EPF condition, the guide provided prompt-based scaffolding to foster evaluative and causal historical reasoning about the differences the learner identified. All learners completed a post knowledge test to assess learning. A one-way ANOVA revealed that learners in the EPF condition learned significantly more than learners in the control condition F(1,42) = 4.2, p < .05, η 2p = 09 (M = 88%; SD = 17% and M = 78%; SD = 17, respectively). Learners reported a trend towards experiencing high mean levels of enjoyment and curiosity and low levels of boredom and frustration across conditions.
Significance: The effectiveness of the EPF condition provides detailed pedagogical design guidelines for automating tutorial messages into mobile AR history apps to enhance learning. The emotion results provide convergent evidence with prior research (Harley et al., 2016) that students enjoy learning with mobile AR apps. Designing intelligent mobile AR apps with a pedagogical agent will allow students to effectively learn about history and other topics through active and on-site learning that these apps are not yet able to support otherwise (Harley et al., 2016).

Authors

• Jason Matthew Harley, University of Alberta

• Tara Tressel, McGill University

• Amanda Jarrell, McGill University

• Susanne P. Lajoie, McGill University

• Laura Pipe, McGill University