MUSHI-Life

Presenter Richard Joiner

Designer : Chris Quintana

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MUSHI-Life

• MUSHI-Life is a multi-user simulation with integrated handheld devices

• Groups of students assume roles as environmental entomologists.

• A tablet computer shows a simulation

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MUSHI-Life

• The simulation contains different insect-like “bugs” with different physical characteristics

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MUSHI-Life

• A set of rules describes how the bugs reproduce, feed, and interact with other bugs in the environment.

• The survival ability of a given bug is governed – its phenotype, – different characteristics of the environment, – characteristics of other bugs it may encounter

in the simulation.

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MUSHI-Life

• Students can view the overall simulation on the tablet computer

• Use individual PDAs to "capture" and "release" individual bugs

• Use them to view magnified, detailed portions of the global environment, such as the interaction of a given set of bugs or the characteristics of a given bug.

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MUSHI-Life

• MUSHI-Life is designed to support students' explorations of questions surrounding natural selection and adaptability.

• It may be used in an observational investigation to identify behavioral patterns related to survival within native contexts.

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MUSHI-Life

• It can be used to directly observe the effects of moving a bug to a non-native environment

• Users can explicitly manipulate bug characteristics to experimentally determine their relationship to adaptation and survival.

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MUSHI-Life

• MUSHI-Life provides a framework to give learners multiple linked representations of a simulation

• They can explore and manipulate a scientific simulation

• See different aspects of the simulation at different levels of granularity.

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MUSHI-Life

• See that there are different levels to understanding in complex simulations

• Understand how local interactions can impact the global behavior of the simulation.

• Engage in more reflective thinking

• Engage in the types of social interactions that can positively impact learning.

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MUSHI-Life

• The first prototype of MUSHI-Life was completed in June 2005.

• Initial focus group testing with students ranging from sixth to eight grade will begin in the late 2005,

• classroom-based research studies scheduled for early 2006.

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MUSHI-Lenses

• Representation of phenomena

• MUSHI use multiple and linked representations.

• Bug eyed representation through the hand held computer

• Overall view with the tablet computer.

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MUSHI-Lenses

• Design of activity structure for investigating these phenomena

• The learners engage in systematic observation for the purpose of discovery and or problem solving.

• The activity is an inquiry learning activity

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MUSHI-Lenses

1. students assigned a bug and asked to record the preferred food sources

2. survey the food sources

3. survey for a second time but the sources had been changed

4. predict which bugs would survive in the new conditions

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MUSHI-Lenses

• Incorporate instructional scaffolds to support learning

• MUSHI scaffolds the learner in a number of ways

• Roy Pea’s (2004) framework

• What and Why of Scaffolding– Fading

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MUSHI-Lenses

• How of Scaffolding• Channelling

– Recruitment – Getting the students interest– Reduction in the degrees of freedom – This involves

simplifying the task– Direction maintenance – Keeping them in pursuit of a

particular objective– Marking critical features – marking certain features of

the task that are relevant– Frustration control – Making the activity less stressful

• Modelling solutions of a task

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MUSHI-Lenses

• How of Scaffolding• Channelling

– Recruitment – Getting the students interest– Reduction in the degrees of freedom – This involves

simplifying the task– Direction maintenance – Keeping them in pursuit of a

particular objective– Marking critical features – marking certain features of

the task that are relevant– Frustration control – Making the activity less stressful

• Modelling solutions of a task