Providing Adaptive Support in an Interactive Simulation for Learning

Abstract

Recent rise of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) with unlimited participants, makes employing learning tools such as interactive simulations all but inevitable. Interactive simulations give students the opportunity to experiment with concrete examples and develop better understanding of concepts they have learned. However, some students do not learn well from this relatively unstructured form of interaction, suggesting the provision of adaptive support as a way to address this issue. This paper presents a formal evaluation of providing support to facilitate open exploration. We describe the process of designing an intervention delivery mechanism for adding adaptive support to an exploratory interactive simulation. The experimental evaluation of the adaptive version of the simulation indicates that the adaptive support provided to students significantly improved their learning performance. Quantitative and qualitative evaluations of users' acceptance of the system are generally positive but pinpoint areas for improvement.