Analysing the Relationship Between Mental Load or Mental Effort and Metacomprehension Under Different Conditions of Multimedia Design

Cognitive load theory assumes effort may only lead to comprehension if the material-induced load leaves enough resources for learning processes. Therefore, multimedia materials should induce as little non-relevant load as possible. Metacognition research assumes that learners tap into their memory processes to generate a mental representation of their comprehension to regulate learning. However, when judging their comprehension, learners need to make inferences about actual understanding using cues such as their experienced mental load and effort during learning. Theoretical assumptions would assume both to affect understanding and its metacognitive representation (metacomprehension). However, the question remains how perceived effort and load are related to metacomprehension judgments while learning with multimedia learning material. Additionally, it remains unclear if this varies under different conditions of multimedia design. To better understand the relationship between perceived mental load and effort and comprehension and metacomprehension under different design conditions of multimedia material, we conducted a randomised between-subjects study (N = 156) varying the design of the learning material (text-picture integrated, split attention, active integration). Mediation analyses testing for both direct and indirect effects of mental load and effort on metacomprehension judgments showed various effects. Beyond indirect effects via comprehension, both mental load and effort were directly related to metacomprehension, however, this seems to vary under different conditions of multimedia design, at least for mental effort. As the direction of effect can only be theoretically assumed, but was not empirically tested, follow-up research needs to identify ways to manipulate effort and load perceptions without tinkering with metacognitive processes directly. Despite the limitations due to the correlative design, this research has implications for our understanding of cognitive and metacognitive processes during learning with multimedia.

The Effect of Cue Labeling in Multimedia Learning: Evidence From Eye Tracking

Cue labels are useful during multimedia learning. According to spatial contiguity principle, people learn more when related words and pictures are displayed spatially near one another. Well-arranged labels of multimedia material can greatly facilitate learning. This study used eye tracking to examine the joint influence of label size (large vs. small) and color (included vs. not) on multimedia learning. The results revealed that larger labels led to better retention test performance and a higher AOI glance count, but no cueing effect was found for color. Cues have a certain attention-leading function that promotes the learner remembering the content. These findings suggest that salient labels that provide explanatory information can guide learners’ attention and facilitate learning, though a combination of label size and color salience did not demonstrate a superior cueing effect.

Refuting student teachers’ misconceptions about multimedia learning

Prior research indicates that student teachers frequently have misconceptions about multimedia learning. Our experiment with N = 96 student teachers revealed that, in contrast to standard texts, refutation texts are effective to address misconceptions about multimedia learning. However, there seems to be no added benefit of making “concessions” to student teachers’ prior beliefs (i.e., two-sided argumentation) in refutation texts. Moreover, refutation texts did not promote the selection of appropriate multimedia material. This study suggests that refutation texts addressing multimedia-learning misconceptions should be applied in teacher education. Yet, further support seems needed to aid the application of the corrected knowledge.

Design of Digital Image Watermarking Technique with Two Stage Vector Extraction in Transform Domain

Multimedia data in various forms is now readily available because of the widespread usage of Internet technology. Unauthorized individuals abuse multimedia material, for which they should not have access to, by disseminating it over several web pages, to defraud the original copyright owners. Numerous patient records have been compromised during the surge in COVID-19 incidents. Adding a watermark to any medical or defense documents is recommended since it protects the integrity of the information. This proposed work is recognized as a new unique method since an innovative technique is being implemented. The resilience of the watermarked picture is quite crucial in the context of steganography. As a result, the emphasis of this research study is on the resilience of watermarked picture methods. Moreover, the two-stage authentication for watermarking is built with key generation in the section on robust improvement. The Fast Fourier transform (FFT) is used in the entire execution process of the suggested framework in order to make computing more straightforward. With the Singular Value Decomposition (SVD) accumulation of processes, the overall suggested architecture becomes more resilient and efficient. A numerous quality metrics are utilized to find out how well the created technique is performing in terms of evaluation. In addition, several signal processing attacks are used to assess the effectiveness of the watermarking strategy.

SYNTHESIS: A Platform of Platforms for Integrated Management, Curation, and Visualization of Digital Cultural Experiences through VR and AR Technologies

SYNTHESIS is a platform of platforms (PoP) for the management, curation, and creation of digital cultural experiences related to cultural heritage material (artifacts), and their visualization through mobile applications and virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR) technologies. The digital cultural experiences may relate to specific cultural heritage monuments or exhibits of museum collections and may reside either on site or remotely. The platform provides a comprehensive supervisory tool that allows curators to select digital artifacts from different databases around the topic of interest, associate them through narratives that translate them into a sequence of semantic correlations that can be visualized using VR/AR technologies. The SYNTHESIS of platforms contributes to the creation of a new condition for the promotion of cultural heritage sites, museums, and exhibits, and facilitates the management and interaction of the user-visitor with them. The platform contributes to the creation of an innovative system for the management and curation of large volume of digital material related to an exhibit and consequently its promotion by unifying the stages of: (a) production of digital content; (b) connection of additional digital multimedia material related to the digital content; (c) curation of the digital content and transformation to a digital experience in accordance to a desired narrative; and (d) visualization of the digital experience in-situ or remotely with the use of mobile apps and VR/AR technologies.

Augmented Reality Application for Handheld Devices

The Pavia University History Museum, which houses historic items mainly connected to the physics and medicine fields, has focused in the past years on new ways to involve its public and to attract new audiences. Among different approaches, digital technologies have proven important to both external and internal communication. Lately, an Augmented Reality application has been made available to visitors, offering in one tool multimedia material of a historical-scientific nature: stories, 3D animations, images and user-generated video storytelling (developed mainly by University students, one of our least present demographics before the App, and younger students, who typically participate in the annual co-creative project). The App was designed to be as non-intrusive and discreet as possible, to preserve the historic ambiance of the museum, to unite social and educational aspects, to register user behaviour and to make the museum experience more vibrant and active and therefore captivating.

The Views of Turkish Language Teachers on Distance Education and Digital Literacy during Covid-19 Pandemic

Distance education, which provides flexibility in the learning environment, is an important learning model that complements face-to-face education. However, during the unanticipated Covid-19 pandemic, the distance education model was employed as an alternative instruction model, albeit temporarily, and certain problems were experienced in this process. In this context, the views of the Turkish language teachers on distance education and digital literacy in Turkey, where average population is quite young and the impact of the pandemic was substantial, was investigated in the present study. The study was conducted with the phenomenological design, a qualitative research method, and the study group included middle school Turkish language teachers who conducted distance education during the four months of the pandemic process. In the study, a semi-structured interview form, developed by the authors, was employed as the data collection instrument, and the collected data were analyzed with content analysis. The study findings revealed problems such as student attendance; digital problems such as Internet connectivity, infrastructure, and system; interaction, interest and commitment; literacy problems such as inability of distance education to improve written expression skills of the students; inadequate synchronous/online class count and duration, and poor parent-student-teacher cooperation. Based on these findings, it was recommended to design multimedia material that allow bidirectional interaction and improve inter-institutional cooperation to solve digital problems.

The Spanish Collocation Tool and Its Application in Corpus-Based Study of Spanish for Teaching and Learning

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a developed software program called the “Spanish Collocation Tool (SCT)” and its application in related corpus-based studies. The Spanish Collocation Tool (SCT) was designed to assist with the research and analysis of Spanish collocation. The SCT allows searches of collocated elements not limited to words, but also parts of speech and lemmas. Furthermore, it can compare two collocation lists to detect any significant differences between them. In this study, this collocation tool, SCT, and a constructed L3 Taiwanese learners’ written corpus of Spanish called CEATE were combined to create efficient access to results in a systematic approach. Furthermore, by using the SCT, the pedagogical implications of the search results for the development of on-line multimedia material for learning Spanish collocations are discussed in the end.

Understanding teacher design practices for digital inquiry–based science learning: the case of Go-Lab

Designing and implementing online or digital learning material is a demanding task for teachers. This is even more the case when this material is used for more engaged forms of learning, such as inquiry learning. In this article, we give an informed account of Go-Lab, an ecosystem that supports teachers in creating Inquiry Learning Spaces (ILSs). These ILSs are built around STEM–related online laboratories. Within the Go-Lab ecosystem, teachers can combine these online laboratories with multimedia material and learning apps, which are small applications that support learners in their inquiry learning process. The Go-Lab ecosystem offers teachers ready–made structures, such as a standard inquiry cycle, alternative scenarios or complete ILSs that can be used as they are, but it also allows teachers to configure these structures to create personalized ILSs. For this article, we analyzed data on the design process and structure of 2414 ILSs that were (co)created by teachers and that our usage data suggest have been used in classrooms. Our data show that teachers prefer to start their design from empty templates instead of more domain–related elements, that the makeup of the design team (a single teacher, a group of collaborating teachers, or a mix of teachers and project members) influences key design process characteristics such as time spent designing the ILS and number of actions involved, that the characteristics of the resulting ILSs also depend on the type of design team and that ILSs that are openly shared (i.e., published in a public repository) have different characteristics than those that are kept private.

PyRosetta Jupyter Notebooks Teach Biomolecular Structure Prediction and Design

ABSTRACT Biomolecular structure drives function, and computational capabilities have progressed such that the prediction and computational design of biomolecular structures is increasingly feasible. Because computational biophysics attracts students from many different backgrounds and with different levels of resources, teaching the subject can be challenging. One strategy to teach diverse learners is with interactive multimedia material that promotes self-paced, active learning. We have created a hands-on education strategy with a set of 16 modules that teach topics in biomolecular structure and design, from fundamentals of conformational sampling and energy evaluation to applications, such as protein docking, antibody design, and RNA structure prediction. Our modules are based on PyRosetta, a Python library that encapsulates all computational modules and methods in the Rosetta software package. The workshop-style modules are implemented as Jupyter Notebooks that can be executed in the Google Colaboratory, allowing learners access with just a Web browser. The digital format of Jupyter Notebooks allows us to embed images, molecular visualization movies, and interactive coding exercises. This multimodal approach may better reach students from different disciplines and experience levels, as well as attract more researchers from smaller labs and cognate backgrounds to leverage PyRosetta in science and engineering research. All materials are freely available at https://github.com/RosettaCommons/PyRosetta.notebooks.