Development of an Analysis System and Class Recordings linked

to More than One Course Evaluation Data using Smartphones

Akihiro Aoyagi

, Darold Davis

, Takuya Kato

and Akinobu Ando

Miraitos, Inc., 6F Kitame-machi 2-39, Aoba-ku, Sendai, Japan

Replicant AD, LLC 1145 Walnut Street, Berkeley, CA 94707-2616,U.S.A.

Iwanuma Elementary School, Chuo2-1-1,Iwanuma, Japan

Miyagi University of Education, 149Aramaki-Aoba,Aoba-ku, Sendai, Japan

Keywords: Lesson Analysis, Smartphone, Video Collaboration, Immediacy, Lesson Visualization.

Abstract: In this present research, we have developed a class analysis system with the goal of lesson improvement.

The system is web-based application, and works by general hardware, for example standard laptop, USB

cameras, and smartphones. The characteristics of this system are, while recording the lesson with two USB

cameras, more than one classroom observer can record lessons using three buttons (“good!”, “what?”, “!?”)

and one text field with the smartphone as an information evaluation input terminal. Using this lesson

analysis system, you can reduce the specialized equipment that is needed when recording and analysis of the

class. So, when the teacher is reflecting back on his own class and making refinements to the lessons, they

can do it quickly and easily. In this study, at an actual elementary school in Japan, for the teacher to reflect

upon their lessons, it will be beneficial in actually using this system to make improvements to the class.

1 INTRODUCTION

"Lesson Research" has long been conducted in

Japan. In lesson research in Japan, after the class is

over, it's common for the teachers who conduct

classes, and the person who sits in on the lesson (for

inspection) to have an open meeting reflecting back

about the lesson that took place. In the meeting, the

participants will have a discussion about the good

points and bad points of the lesson. Through this

review, the teacher is able to refine the technology

for conducting lessons in a class. The technique of

using audio-visual equipment for the analysis of

classroom lessons came into the field of educational

technology in the 1970s. Since that time, methods to

record lessons using a video camera and for

reflecting on those lessons using video have been

developed. This method that had been used of the

teacher and class inspector reflecting on the lesson

after class using recorded video was called “class

analysis by stop motion method”. In particular,

"VTR interruption strategy" several video cameras

are prepared, recording teachers and students at the

same time, then at the class review meeting that

video footage is paused for discussion. With a

method of using recorded video lessons like this,

many can share the video scenes more concretely.

So, rather than a meeting about the lesson that relies

solely on memory, it can be discussed based on the

images that can be commonly understood by

everyone which is an advantage. However, looking

at the video from the beginning to the end of class

requires more time, or about the same as the class

time. And, even if you want to see only the class

scenes of concern, it is difficult even to fast-forward

to the scene in the video. When recording with a

single camera, you can only record from one point

of view. In the introspection meeting, it’s important

to grasp not only what the teacher is doing, but also

what the students are doing as well.

For that reason, it certainly is better if multiple

video cameras were installed in the classroom. But

eventually, because the preparation is an enormous

task, there is no opportunity to use this setup on a

daily basis. It is in these recent years by a dedicated

data input terminal that marking above the recorded

video’s timeline to cue distinguishing scenes and a

system that can also look back on the each lessons

evaluation information has been developed (Photron,

2012). This is available for a wide range of training,

such as teaching nursing practice and job interviews.

However, although the function is good however

Aoyagi A., Davis D., Kato T. and Ando A..

Development of an Analysis System and Class Recordings linked to More than One Course Evaluation Data using Smartphones.

DOI: 10.5220/0004384500430047

In Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Computer Supported Education (CSEDU-2013), pages 43-47

ISBN: 978-989-8565-53-2

 2013 SCITEPRESS (Science and Technology Publications, Lda.)

because of the high price it is not easily available in

the general education setting. Furthermore, in

addition to the evaluation information input terminal

and special equipment, you must purchase the

required number of devices.

In this study, we aimed to develop a class

analysis system that can use ordinary smartphones as

evaluation information input terminals

2 SYSTEM OVERVIEW

2.1 Development Concept

The concept of this development system is to reduce

the burden on the user as much as possible without

the use of a special environment or equipment.

Therefore, a Centrino spec Windows laptop with a

Core2 CPU, and 1 GB of memory, can run iPhone

and Android smartphones or phones as a cheap

ordinary USB camera, and evaluation of information

input device. The operating environment was

composed of all freeware. As a development idea,

we expect to formulate a “good!” lesson and to

promote the improvement of teaching classes. So we

named this system Good Processor.

2.2 Structure of the System

The system configuration can be broadly divided

into the following components:

1. Web server

2. Recording process

3. Screen drawing

4. Evaluation input process

5. Composed of the data storage unit

As mentioned previously, the system is

configured with all freeware. The Web server is

using Apache, the recording process is managed

using Red5; the data storage is handled by PHP and

MySQL, and Flex is used for graph drawing and

operation screen (Figure 1). Once installed, it’s not

necessary to adjust the settings for everything in

order to start the OS service level. When you want to

use the system, if you connect a USB camera to a

PC it’s possible to start taking recordings of the

lessons.

By way of a Wi-Fi connection, possibly a 3G,

evaluation data is sent to the system from the

smartphone or mobile phone in use by the inspector.

Since the system provides no constraints with regard

to the number of connections, it’s possible to make

connections up to the limit of the physical Wi-Fi

Figure 1: Structure of the System.

2.3 System Functionality

The system consists of a component that displays the

analysis result from the recorded data and a part that

records the lesson data. In order to record data, the

person inspecting the class holds a smartphone or

tablet PC and an evaluation input page for

instructional use is display (Figure 2).

Figure 2: An evaluation input page on a smartphone.

The evaluation input page, has 3 kinds of buttons,

and a comments field. The inspector while observing

the lesson presses the “good!” button when they

think it’s good and presses the “what?” button when

they think it’s not so good, and after it’s confirmed

the “!?” is pressed when they think it’s good. If,

when you want to record something of note, you can

also send comments. While receiving evaluation

data from each terminal, the systems records what

kind of evaluation data was sent, when, and from

which terminal into a database. When the class

concludes, the analysis results screen appears

(Figure 3).

Web Serve

CSEDU2013-5thInternationalConferenceonComputerSupportedEducation

Figure 3: A sample of an analysis results screen.

At the analysis screen, evaluation information that

was recorded is added up, and a comment and graph

display is performed. By the data display, there is a

recorded video lesson and comments, a chart that

can add up each data at any time interval and, one

can grasp the state of the class by the time series line

chart graph that’s connected with that. When each

data is clicked, the video is cued to the scene that

was sent to that data. The evaluation information

time that was sent is recorded in seconds in order to

make a graph seek the aggregate results minute by

minute by the initial settings. This time, the options

are modifiable depending on the purpose. For

example, if a graph is made for the aggregate results

every 10 minutes, one is able to grasp the rough state

of the class. On the other hand, if we aggregate

every 30 seconds one will understand the lesson in

finer detail. By clicking on the video, graph or

comment the display can be enlarged. By using this,

one can see easier when reflecting on class lessons

(Figure 4).

3 CLASS ANALYSIS CASE

Good Processor has been adopted as a means to

improve the teacher's lecture in Miyagi Prefecture

Iwanuma city school. In this paper, a case that took

place on 9/28/2012 is described. The class was a

second grade Japanese language class. In this class,

“watch for scenes in the story, and being able to read

the feeling and state of a person” are the goals.

There were 22 teachers who sat in on classes and

entered the evaluation information. Evaluators, with

smartphone in hand, visited classes while taking

notes with a pen, as shown in figure 5.

Figure 4: Views of enlarged each element.

Figure 5: An evaluator, with smartphone in hand, inputting

comments and remarks while taking notes with a pen.

DevelopmentofanAnalysisSystemandClassRecordingslinkedtoMorethanOneCourseEvaluationDatausing

Smartphones

Figure 6 shows the state of class in an actual

situation. In the foreground, a notebook that has the

system installed is pictured.

Figure 6: A state of class in an actual situation.

After the lesson, all the teachers who sat in on

classes had a meeting reflecting on the lessons at the

Board of Education. At this conference a description

was given about the classes that day from the

teachers that made the first lessons.

Next, the teachers who participated were divided

into groups and discussed good points,

improvements and the points that have been devised

based on the results of the analysis about the lessons.

And then we present the results that were discussed,

and a concrete improvement plan was discussed with

all the participants. Finally, we received advice from

the Board of Education committee.

Figure 7 is a line chart shown in a time series of

the lesson evaluation data.

Figure 7: Time series line graph.

This diagram has the aggregation set for every 2

minutes. The line has changed considerably;

however “good!” shows changes that were pressed.

Although we see there are some mountainous peeks,

those parts mean the places many people thought

were ″ good ″ scenes. Near the bottom of the

diagram, another graph can be seen. “what?” button

is the state of how little has changed can be seen at

the bottom of the figure.

In this class, around 20 minutes after the start of

the lesson, there is a scene in which the inspectors

received a ″not so good″ impression. We know that

there was something wrong with that part of the

lesson, since the graph of “good!” has fallen. On the

other hand, around 38 minutes after the start of the

lesson, despite the increasing number of “good!” we

have found many people who received the ”not so

good” impression.

In summary, since the evaluation is divided, this

scene can be said to be a scene that is worth

discussing concerning what someone would think. In

the class, there are times where the best scenes that

were evaluated where in the middle of the first half

of the class. Here, some scenes the teacher

questioned the students regarding reading. These

scenes are an important influence that greatly affects

the success or failure of this class. These scenes,

which are the top rated, can be said to have the

desired results. On the other hand, after 28 minutes,

the number of “good!” reduces and “what?”

increases. This part is, is the place many people in

the class thought “what?” since we have less time

than the rest of the lesson plan, this part is a scene in

which the teacher has changed the schedule of

classes. Before this scene, the students were talking

about when reading, how to tell a story vividly to the

listener. However we were not able to take

advantage of the results of that discussion.

In the case of the debate by the inspectors, when

using the system it was easy to understand if it were

a scene where you needed to hold discussions. But if

this system is not used, the inspectors would just say

the point that they were worried about and would

have spoken only what they thought. However,

using the system, the differences of opinion and

other people's thoughts appear in the shape of a

graph. When using a survey by questionnaire

available in a 5-point scale, the readability of the

screen had an average rating of 4.4, and the

readability of the results was 3.9. The main

comments of “it’s interesting and could be evaluated

quantitatively in class”, “other teachers could

understand how their feelings changed while

observing the class”, and “they could grasp the most

critical point of the lessons” was the positive

assessment of the class. On the other hand as for

improvement points, “because I’m not accustomed

to the operation of a smartphone I wouldn’t know

how to use it”, “the weight of the smartphone is a bit

heavy”, “I want to also see the analysis result screen

on a tablet PC” were some of the things mentioned.

CSEDU2013-5thInternationalConferenceonComputerSupportedEducation

4 CONCLUSIONS

In this study, a system for analysis and reflection of

class lessons was developed. The goal was to make

it easy as possible in a practical classroom and for an

investigative review committee to examine. The

system can record lesson from two point of view and

evaluation data from more than one classroom

observer inputted by smartphone. By using a

smartphone made to correspond to the input

terminal, the preparation was possible in a short time

even when using a laptop and USB camera. From

the graph and chart that aggregates the data, the

flexible visualization of the class could be realized.

At an actual elementary school, it was used as a

means to look back on the lessons and I was able to

get high ratings from teachers. And, the main

comments from teacher were the positive assessment

of the class. However, there were several comments

as for improvement points of the system. For that

reason, In the future, it is necessary to proceed with

the support in the form of a tablet PC and other

devices.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work was supported by KAKENHI (24730721).

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Nakajima, T., 2008. Supporting for Teaching

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Ogawa, H., Kakegawa, J., Ishida, T., Morihiro, K., 2012.

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DevelopmentofanAnalysisSystemandClassRecordingslinkedtoMorethanOneCourseEvaluationDatausing

Smartphones