PROJECT TITLE :

Supporting Teacher Orchestration in Ubiquitous Learning Environments: A Study in Primary Education

ABSTRACT:

Throughout the last decades, academic contexts have remodeled into advanced technological and social ecologies, with mobile devices expanding the scope of education beyond the traditional classroom, creating thus-called Ubiquitous Learning Environments (ULEs). But, these new technological opportunities entail an extra burden for academics, who want to manage and coordinate the resources involved in such advanced instructional situations in an exceedingly process called “orchestration”. This paper presents the analysis of the orchestration support provided by GLUEPS-AR, a system aimed to assist teachers in the coordination of across-areas learning situations applied in ULEs. The evaluation, following an interpretive research perspective, relied on a study where a pre-service teacher designed and enacted an authentic across-areas learning scenario during a primary school. The situation, that illustrates the orchestration challenges of ULEs, was geared toward fostering orienteering skills. It spanned 5 sessions taking place within the classroom, in the varsity's playground and at a nearby park, using multiple technologies and devices. The evaluation showed that GLUEPS-AR helped the teacher in the multiple aspects of orchestration, as well as implementation of his pedagogical ideas, adaptation in runtime, and sharing of orchestration load with students. Teacher awareness throughout out of doors activities was the most aspect to enhance upon.