Final+Paper+(Draft)

=**Project Description:**=

The project was designed for ESL students in grades 5-6. The primary goal was to create a VIE that would be used as a review game to check students' understanding while completing a science/biology thematic unit. The prototype would eventually be exported to Second Life in order to give the program a more realistic feel as well as allow for more interactions for the student user.

=Literature Review:=

The need for ESL (English as a second language) programs in America has risen in the last decade. A survey conducted by NCELA found that the percentage of ESL students in American schools has grown 52% since 1998 (Growing Number of English Learners 2007-2008, 2010). In addition the U.S Census Bureau statistics show that the majority of children in America have (other than English), Spanish as their first language. Chinese, French, German, Tagalog, Vietnamese, Italian, Korean, and Polish (Hyon, B. et al, 2003) are cited as the other leading foreign languages spoken in America. These statistics show that there is a dire need for ESL programs to accommodate the needs of these children. More often than not, however, programs created to assist children in gaining English as a second language fail to either: 1) Help maintain the child’s native language and 2) Support the child in their quest to achieve a functional use of a second language. It is important that ESL software programs will either assist in facilitation of language learning or provide excellent supplemental material for the learner to use in order to learn the second language while maintaining use of their native tongue. The use of interactive media or virtual reality, will allow the user to become engrossed in the digitally created world and allow students to practice their language skills in a low anxiety environment, allowing bilingualism to freely be developed. The following brief literature review covers previous research conducted in the field of ESL and virtual reality, which assisted us in completing our project.

==== The need for ESL (English as a second language) programs in America has risen in the last decade. A survey conducted by NCELA found that the percentage of ESL students in American schools has grown 52% since 1998 (Growing Number of English Learners 2007-2008, 2010). In addition the U.S Census Bureau statistics show that the majority of children in America have (other than English), Spanish as their first language. Chinese, French, German, Tagalog, Vietnamese, Italian, Korean, and Polish (Hyon, B. et al, 2003) are cited as the other leading foreign languages spoken in America. These statistics show that there is a dire need for ESL programs to accommodate the needs of these children. More often than not, however, programs created to assist children in gaining English as a second language fail to either: 1) Help maintain the child’s native language and 2) Support the child in their quest to achieve a functional use of a second language. It is important that ESL software programs will either assist in facilitation of language learning or provide excellent supplemental material for the learner to use in order to learn the second language while maintaining use of their native tongue. The use of interactive media or virtual reality, will allow the user to become engrossed in the digitally created world and allow students to practice their language skills in a low anxiety environment, allowing bilingualism to freely be developed. The following brief literature review covers previous research conducted in the field of ESL and virtual reality, which assisted us in completing our project. ====

==== Second Language Acquisition research has focused on the role of interaction in the negotiation of meaning, an important factor for L2 (the target language) acquisition. Negotiation of meaning is: “ a term that has been used to characterize the modifications and restructurings of interaction that occurs when learners and their interlocutors anticipate, perceive, or experience difficulties in message comprehensibility. As they negotiate, the work linguistically to achieve the needed comprehensibility, whether reputing a message verbatim, adjusting its syntax, changing its words, or modifying its form and meaning in a host of other ways" (Pica, 1994; cited by Peterson, 2001). The earliest merger of second language learning and technology occurred in the 1990s with the development of MOOs (MUD: Multi-User Dimension): a VR based multi-user, object-oriented domain. More commonly, they are known as text-based adventures. These allowed users to role-play create interactive fiction and conduct online chats. MOO is based on the constructivist approach that postulates that the learning environment must be socially situated to allow learners to collaborate in order to procure new knowledge. MOOs encouraged users to create their own meaningful artifacts and multimedia objects (Peterson, 2001). MOOs have primarily been used in Japan for ESL learning before software or programs like Rosetta Stone or Active Worlds was introduced; the latter actually being a very popular program for University-level Japanese ESL students currently. Using this computer technology for language learning purposes (CALL), students have shown greater scholastic achievement and it has encouraged greater interaction between teachers and students and students and their peers, thus helping them connect to the greater world. It fosters wonderful stimuli for second language learning as it can provide communicative activities, games (Lai, 2006), and grant a motivating learning experience for students. Technology advances has allowed newer virtual products to produce real-life practice for children. One example is the interactive narrative WebQuest ‘Panique a Bord’ a LanguageQuest situated on a 3D model of the Titanic which centers on a detective-like problem solving task, involving integrated training of language skills and triggering interviews with the avatars of the story characters (Koenraad, 2008) in another language. These two examples show that VR allows students to become immersed in a problem and enhance learner involvement and enlarge global understanding. Virtual reality can create an environment for students that is low anxiety since they are working in a world all their own. They can learn and explore at their own pace, and repeat items if needed for extra practice (Morton & Jack, 2005). Virtual reality also supports “Dogme Style” teaching. The “Dogme” approach doesn’t focus on extremely structured lessons and puts the learner at the center of the lessons. It creates a relevant world for the language speakers and encourages them to create their own conversations (Vickers, 2010). Zon, an extremely successful game for students learning Mandarin, takes this approach by allowing players to explore the world at their own pace and complete realistic scenarios such as arriving at the airport or going shopping. All is done in the comfort of your home and it does not matter if you make a mistake. ====

=Project Explanation:=

==== For this project, we created an educational scavenger hunt concentrating on topics that many students will encounter in everyday life. ESL students have typically used drill and memorize methods in order to learn English. Although it works in theory, students need to have a break in that routine. Creating a game that builds upon what they are learning in the classroom can help students become more open towards learning a second language We interviewed a local ESL teacher and it was suggested we focus on common conversational topics such as food, animals, sports, or weather. This includes topics such as animals and weather. We decided to incorporate both these ideas together in a lesson on climates. The age groups we are targeting are 4-6 grade (elementary/early middle school) children. The learning theory, which our project will be based on, is constructivism. Constructivism is where the learner constructs their understanding of the world through experience (Wilson et. al, 1995; cited by Peterson, 2001). This theory allows students to grow and learn through socially mediated activities and collaboration. Students will be able to explore the world and complete a scavenger hunt at their own pace. The students will learn new vocabulary in context as they read short conversations from different characters and plant life. There is no ending to the game, so students can go back in and repeat pieces of the program. The reason we choose to create a scavenger a hunt is because it really takes advantage of the use of virtual reality. This format fits three principles for a successful learning environment as it, "situates students within an authentic learning context; third, gives students tasks that must be completed by analyzing the information they get and devising a course of action" (Schank & Kass, 1996). Scavenger hunts are a great way "for teaching basic facts and declarative knowledge" (Kapp & Driscoll, 2010). They also allow students to travel to destinations not ordinarily accessible in real life. This worked perfectly for our climate lesson. The students will be able to explore being in different areas: plains, desert, tundra, and forest without having to leave their classroom. Many scavenger hunts are often timed, but in further research, we found out that having a timer could negatively influence performance (Shih & Yang, 2008). If students feel pressured to find something or understand something in a certain amount of time they may get frustrated and leave. We decided to leave our scavenger hunt open to the students and allow them to repeat information as many times as they wanted until they found all the answers. Also, by having students reread the character responses it is a great form of vocabulary development (Cunningham & Stanovich, 1998). We also thought after completing this scavenger hunt, the instructor could use this tool as a way to encourage students to use their new vocabulary by creating stories or presentations on what they have just experienced. ====

=Technology Choice:=

==== Our group decided to use the Alice tool because of its ease of use and cost. Our final project in production would be created in Second Life, but the learning curve is much higher than Alice. Alice is a great prototyping tool for non-developers. It allows instructional designers to show a proof of concept with little programming or 3D knowledge. Alice is freeware, whereas we would have to purchase space in Second Life and buy 3D objects in order to use in our scenes. Overall Alice was a great tool to use and is highly recommended. Our prototype has a more structured interface, but in Second Life we envision students using their mouse to navigate through the worlds, interacting with the various characters. They could also teleport from place to place instead of using the arrow keys. ====

**Do you think it 'worked' or 'will work'?**
==== Alice fulfilled its purpose as it created a viable and usable program that the sample target audience (4-6 grade) responded greatly towards. It allowed the students to interact with objects and characters, navigate through different climate areas and allowed them to learn more about climates and the animal kingdom. ====

**If you had to do it again, what would you do differently? The same?**
==== We would have liked to get more feedback during development, but our idea evolved over time and after completing more research. There also is a lot of potential to make things highly interactive in Alice and it would have been nice to have more time to explore all the possibilities in that program. ====

**If you worked with an audience, what did your audience think of your project?**
==== The Alice prototype was administered to a group of three fifth-graders at Willis Intermediate in the Delaware City Schools district. Their teacher was well looked at the program and both groups were given a survey in order to elicit their thoughts about the project. ====

==== The students were overall thrilled at the game and really enjoyed playing it. They liked the questions and the pop-up boxes that would accompany some questions. The liked the “plains” area the most as they seemed to have a liking for animals. Some constructive criticism, which has now been correct, was that there was not enough time to read the dialogue and they wanted more animals and areas. The limitations of keeping this project within Alice was shown with the students’ latter statement as there was a finite variation of animals that fit appropriately within each climate zone. Within Second Life this project will most likely have much more flexibility in adding animals and other interactions. ==== ==== The teacher was very positive towards the project. She mentioned some of the same concerns that the student had. She was willing to try VIEs in class, however, noted that most districts do not allow it. For example, Second Life is banned and can only be accessed with permission from the district. ====

=References:=

Retrieved Jan 27, 2001 from []
Vickers, Howard. 2010. VirtualQuests: Dialogic Language Learning with 3D Virtual Worlds. //CORELL:// // Computer Resources for Language Learning // 3, 75-81.