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Learning differences and eye fixation patterns in virtual and physical science laboratories
ARTICLE

, Department of Athletics ; , , Graduate Institute of Digital Learning and Education ; , Graduate Institute of Science Education ; , Graduate Institute of Digital Learning and Education

Computers & Education Volume 82, Number 1, ISSN 0360-1315 Publisher: Elsevier Ltd

Abstract

This project analyzed high school students' performance and eye movement while learning in a simulation-based laboratory (SBL) and a microcomputer-based laboratory (MBL). Although the SBL and the MBL both used computers to collect, graph, and analyze data, the MBL involved manual manipulation of concrete materials, whereas the SBL displayed everything on a monitor. Fifty senior high school students at three urban public high schools in Taipei were randomly assigned to the MBL and SBL settings. The participants conducted the Boyle's Law experiment with an accompanying worksheet and completed pre- and post-conceptual tests. FaceLAB and ASL MobileEye were used to record each participant's eye movements in the SBL and MBL settings, respectively. The results showed that lower achievers improved significantly from the pre-to post-conceptual tests. The SBL group tended to carry out more experiments. Moreover, the MBL group's performance on the worksheet was moderately correlated with their post-test. However, this correlation was not found for the SBL group. Furthermore, at the beginning of the laboratories, the SBL group had a higher percentage of fixations with longer fixation duration, which implies more attention to and deeper cognitive processing of the equipment and running experiments, while the MBL group focused on the worksheet. This study concludes that, for e-learning like SBLs, students tend to start off doing an experiment, and then think about the questions on the worksheets, whereas for physical laboratories like MBLs, they tend to think before doing.

Citation

Chien, K.P., Tsai, C.Y., Chen, H.L., Chang, W.H. & Chen, S. (2015). Learning differences and eye fixation patterns in virtual and physical science laboratories. Computers & Education, 82(1), 191-201. Elsevier Ltd. Retrieved June 8, 2023 from .

This record was imported from Computers & Education on January 29, 2019. Computers & Education is a publication of Elsevier.

Full text is availabe on Science Direct: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2014.11.023

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