Designing multimedia learning application with learning theories: A case study on a computer science subject with 2-D and 3-D animated versions

In today’s scenario, computer-based education has become popular and students want to learn on their own with the computer and the teacher acts as a facilitator. Every learning theory has its own concepts and views on learning. Clark (1983) stated that there has been a paradigm shift in the development of education that is from the behaviourist theory to the cognitive and constructivist theories point of view. The following subsections describe these three primary principles in learning. Understanding these principles is essential in order to understand the materials being designed in this study.

2.1 Behavioural Theory

Edward Thorndike and Ivan Pavlov (Mok, 2002) studied behaviourism in the turn of the twentieth century. The theory of behaviourism basically means that every response to a conditional stimulus is a conditioned response. The implication is that humans learn many behaviours because of their pairing with basic human needs and responses, such as the need for food, sleep, reproduction, and the like. The use of reward and punishment is also said to be a part of modifying a behaviour. This work was refined and popularised by B.F. Skinner (Alessi and Trollip, 2001) and gave rise to the behavioural school of psychology and learning. Some of the basic behavioural rules are as follows:

Behaviour that is followed by positive environmental effects (known as positive reinforcement or reward) increases in frequency.
Behaviour that is followed by the withdrawal of negative environmental effects (known as negative reinforcement) also increases in frequency.
Behaviour that is followed by a negative environmental effect (punishment) decreases in frequency.
When behaviour that was previously increased in frequency through reinforcement is no longer reinforced, it decreases in frequency (known as extinction) (Source: Alessi and Trollip, 2001).

According to Hartley and Davies (1978), a few of these behaviourism principles were used widely in education which includes the following:

Learning process becomes easier when students follow the active process of learning.
Learning materials are arranged in logical order to ease students’ learning and encourage feedback.
Each response must have immediate feedback for students to learn from their mistakes.
Each student response must be given a positive or negative reinforcement.

The implication of behavioural theory to this research is inevitable. The display of topic and subtopics must be well structured to assist in smooth learning. Even though the system developed for this study has no direct response to students, nevertheless, the concept of behaviourism is applied throughout the system. The learning process of the system developed is in-par with the objectives and in order with the level of difficulty from less thorough to most difficult. Although behaviourist systems promote teacher-centered learning, this system promotes a student-centered learning environment, which integrates the positive principles of behaviourism with a cognitive-constructivist approach.

2.2 Cognitive Theory

Cognitive theory takes its name from the word cognition, which means the process of knowing. Cognitive psychology puts emphasis on unobservable constructs, such as the mind, memory, attitudes, motivation, thinking, reflection, and other presumed internal processes. The most important study in cognition is based on information-processing approach. In computer science, information processing theories attempt to describe how information in the world enters through our senses, becomes stored in memory, is retained or forgotten, and is used. Most information processing approaches include the notion that memory and thinking have a limited capacity, which accounts for failures in attention and in memory. Also included is the notion of an executive control, which coordinates the learner’s perception, memory, processing, and application of information. Another part of cognitive psychology is semantic network. This theory attempts to parallel how biologists view the connections of the human brain. In the semantic network such as the brain, learning may be represented by removing or adding links between nodes or by creating or changing nodes. For example, new knowledge may be so surprising that people interpret the new information in a way that is congruous with existing knowledge or beliefs. But this new knowledge may become so clear that eventually, existing knowledge must also change to remain acceptable in light of the new knowledge (Alessi and Trollip, 2001; Simonson et al., 2003).

Prominent figures in cognitivism such as Bruner, Piaget and Papert gave emphasis on concepts as follows (Simonson et al., 2003):

How knowledge is arranged and structured.
Students’ readiness to learn.
Give importance to intuition and intellectuality.
Motivation and positive outlook on learning.

The implication of cognitivism towards this study is that the content of the learning subject and the way it is presented is given emphasis. The topic in the system is displayed in a systematical order. Each slide is numbered and each subtopic allows students to use the back and forward arrows for re-learning and strengthening their memory. According to the cognitive theory, humans need to see things in a concrete manner to understand better. The objective of the learning subject is told at the beginning of the slides. As students browse along, they will see a proper sequence to the learning process.

2.3 Constructivist Theory

Constructivism is where each individual learner combines new information with existing knowledge and experiences (Jonassen, 1999). Constructivism is also a philosophical view. The objectivist philosophy, or world view, hold that there is an objective world that is perceived more or less accurately through the senses, and that learning is the process of correctly interpreting the senses and responding correctly to objects and events in the real world.
Constructivism is a relatively recent branch of cognitive psychology that has had a major impact on the thinking of many instructional designers. Constructivist thinking varies broadly on many issues, but the central point is that learning is always a unique product ‘constructed’ as each individual learner combines new information with existing knowledge and experiences. Individual have learned when they have constructed new interpretations of the social, cultural, physical, and intellectual environments in which they live (Dick and Carey, 2005).

There are different schools of constructivism thought. For example, according to social constructivism, learning is inherently social. What we learn in a function of social norms and interpretations, and knowledge is not simply constructed by the individual, but by social groups. Moderate constructivism maintains that there is indeed a real world but that our understanding of it is very individual and changing. More radical constructivism holds that we can never really know the exact nature of the real world, so it is only our interpretations that matter.

One of the more substantial aspects of constructivist thinking is the basis of situated learning (Moore et al., 1994). The theory of situated learning assumes that learning always occurs in certain context, and the context in turn significantly affects learning. The main implication of situated learning theory is that when properly designed, the situation in which learning takes place enhances transfer to other settings.

The anchored instruction approach is closely related to situated learning and is often attributed to one another. Anchored instruction assumes that a learning environment should be embedded in a context that is like the real world: with real world imagery, goals, problems, and activities (Alessi and Trollip, 2001). Proponents of the constructivist approach maintain that designers should be creating educational environments that facilitate the construction of knowledge. There are various principles or suggestions that typically promote ways to accomplish that goal and they are as follows (Alessi and Trollip, 2001):

Emphasise learning rather than teaching.
Emphasise the actions and thinking of learners rather than of teachers.
Emphasis to active learning.
Use discovery or guided discovery approaches.
Encourage learner construction of information and projects.
Have a foundation in situated cognition and its associated notion of anchored instruction.
Use cooperative or collaborative learning activities.
Use purposeful, real or authentic learning activities.
Emphasise learner choice and negotiation of goals, strategies, and evaluation methods.
Encourage personal autonomy on the part of the learners.
Support learner reflection.
Support learner ownership of learning and activities.
Encourage learners to accept and reflect on the complexity of the real world.
Use authentic tasks and activities that are personally relevant to learners.

The implication of using constructivism in this study is immense. Constructivism basically combines new information with existing knowledge and experiences. Therefore, in this research, the development of multimedia animation and static pictures had implemented this concept. For example, at the beginning of the slides, students were shown a cinema sitting. They were told that each sitting in a cinema is mutually exclusive and no two persons will have to share a seat. The same concept is applied in memory management, where each data is given a specific address. The analogy used in the cinema sitting scenario is then repeated in a few slides for recall purposes. The usage of a truck is used to carry data into a large rack. This concept is used so that students can relate the usage of a truck in a store at a hypermarket to store supplies with the same idea related to contiguous memory allocation in a CPU. Furthermore, an excavator concept was used in the slides for the purpose to carry data from the logical address to a physical address, with the idea that students can relate to the actual scene of an excavator carrying heavy bricks from one place to another to build a highway. All these concepts are part of constructivist approach to learning.

2.4 Cognitive-Constructivist Approach - Student Centered Learning

Gibbs (1992) defined student-centered learning as that which, “gives students greater autonomy and control over the choice of subject matter, learning methods and pace of study”. In other words, learners can dictate their own learning relevant to their own approaches. Student-centered learning derived its meaning in a learning environment where knowledge is built and achieved by means of student’s active participation in the learning activities. Students do not passively listen and absorb the delivered information, but learn through a series of discoveries, interactions, inquiries and problem-solving situations they actively engage in (Neo and Neo, 2004).In the student-centered learning mode, there is a need for goals to be set and learning process to be managed. They can no longer rely on the lecturer to tell them what, how, where and when to think. Students should be able to actively choose programmed components in whatever desired order, rather than simply work through a predetermined course of study (Andrewartha and Wilmot, 2001). If teachers were information keepers in a traditional classroom, in a student-centered concept, students were active information seekers. Therefore, researchers have defined student-centered as active learning, learning by ‘doing’ rather than of passive watching or listening.

In order to design such an environment, interactivity is embedded in the learning environment. Ambron (1990) suggests, interactive learning is student-centered learning. In addition, interactive multimedia can be designed to allow users to access information according to their unique interests (Reeves, 1992). The most important goal for adding interactivity is to provide the learner with the choice to decide where to explore first within the application at his or her own pace. Liaw (2001) posits that the hypermedia-based applications are non-linear and allows learners to explore information in their own ways. While Kappe, Maurer and Sherbakov (1993) suggested that hypermedia is the force that puts all previous educational technologies in the shade. Laurillard (1993) agreed that hypertext is controllable by the user and this is the medium’s real strength. As Lambert Gardiner (1993) argued, hypermedia feature in multimedia applications is educationally superior to traditional media because it simulates the real life situation of the students. Just as in real life situation, students are dealing with information from many sources, with interactivity and hypermedia, learners are able to navigate through the application in a non-linear fashion and are able to view topics of interest directly rather than simply viewing a linear presentation. Thus, by allowing students to explore the module on their own in a non-linear fashion, students can learn better in a student-centered environment.