Development and Evaluation of the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’
to Support the Observation and Identification of Indicator
Plants for Vegetation Succession
Keita Muratsu
1
, Fusako Kusunoki
2
, Yoshiaki Takeda
1
, Haruka Inoue
3
, Etsuji Yamaguchi
1
,
Shigenori Inagaki
1
, Hiroshi Mizoguchi
4
and Masanori Sugimoto
5
1
Graduate School of Human Development and Environment, Kobe University, 3-11 Tsurukabuto, Kobe, Japan
2
Faculty of Art and Design, Tama Art University, 3-15-34 Kaminoge Setagaya-ku, Tokyo, Japan
3
Faculty of Human Development, Kobe University, 3-11 Tsurukabuto, Kobe, Japan
4
Faculty of Science and Technology, Tokyo University of Science, 2461 Yamasaki Noda-shi, Chiba, Japan
5
Graduate School of information Science and Technology, Hokkaido University,
Kita 14, Nishi 9 Kita-ku, Sapporo Hokkaido, Japan
Keywords: Mobile Systems, Outdoor Learning, Science Learning.
Abstract: We developed and evaluated a mobile system called ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ for support the observation and
identification of indicator plants for vegetation succession. One characteristic of the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ is
that it uses sketches instead of photographs. This guide contains 3 representative functions that help students
in identifying and observing of indicator plants. These functions include (1) coloured representations of
leaves and fruits; (2) enlarged images of leaves and fruits; and (3) sketches of the backside of the leaves. We
allowed Japanese sixth grade elementary school students (age 11–12 years) to use the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ to
identify and observe indicator plants. After this activity, we used a questionnaire to evaluate the ease with
which the students used the guide, and validated the usefulness of the guide for identifying and observing
indictor plants. The results indicated that the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ was quite easy to use and was effective in
supporting the identification and observation of indicator plants.
1 INTRODUCTION
In the area of the science education, an important
aspect of studying plants is to observe these in
nature, in addition to accumulating classroom
knowledge. However, field identification and
observation of plant types or names is often difficult
when using a large textbook. In recent years,
research has been conducted on using a mobile
device to support the identification and observation
of plants. Previous studies have shown the
effectiveness of mobile devices in identifying and
observing plants (Morita et al., 2004; Huang et al.,
2010). Kusunoki et al., (2011) initiated the
development ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ as a mobile
system to support the efforts of students in
identifying and observing indicator plants. The
‘Pocket Plant Guide’ is a system designed to present
information on 12 types of representative indicator
plants during the early, middle, and late stages of
vegetation succession using an iPhone/iPod Touch
platform. The indicator plants used in the guide were
selected from vegetation succession studies
conducted in the Rokko Mountains of Kobe, Japan.
While previous systems used photographs, the
‘Pocket Plant Guide’ uses sketches, which is one of
its defining characteristics. As is often stressed in
scientific practice, scientists alter the natural world
in some way to facilitate the observation of subjects,
(Lynch, 1990). Scientific activity, such as the
identification and observation of plants, are usually
accomplished through sketches instread of
photographs and this is because it is easier to
visualise the characteristics of plants as a drawing,
compared to photographs.
Inoue et al. (2012) conducted a preliminary
evaluation of the pilot version of this guide. The
results of this initial study indicated that the guide
was effective in supporting the identification and
675
Muratsu K., Kusunoki F., Takeda Y., Inoue H., Yamaguchi E., Inagaki S., Mizoguchi H. and Sugimoto M..
Development and Evaluation of the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ to Support the Observation and Identification of Indicator Plants for Vegetation Succession.
DOI: 10.5220/0004409306750679
In Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Computer Supported Education (CSEDU-2013), pages 675-679
ISBN: 978-989-8565-53-2
Copyright
c
2013 SCITEPRESS (Science and Technology Publications, Lda.)
observation of indicator plants. In addition, we
obtained suggestions towards further development
of the contents and interface for the current version
of the guide.
We completed the development of the ‘Pocket
Plant Guide’ by incorporating the feedback from the
preliminary evaluation. The purpose of this study
was to determine the ease of use of the ‘Pocket Plant
Guide’ and to determine its effectiveness in
supporting the identification and observation of
indicator plants.
2 OUTLINE OF THE ‘POCKET
PLANT GUIDE’
Figure 1 shows the home screen of the ‘Pocket Plant
Guide’. Six types of indicator plants are shown as
icons on this screen. Flicking the screen to the left
reveals the remaining 6 types of indicator plants,
also shown as icons in Figure 2. The teacher
explained to the students that in order to display the
remaining 6 types of indicator plants, the screen
should be flicked to the left. When one of these
icons is tapped, for example, Rubus microphyllus, a
monochromatic sketch of the indicator plant in
Figure 3 appears.
Figure 1: Home screen of the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’.
This guide includes 3 fundamental functions that
support the identification and observation of
indicator plants. First, the characteristic parts of the
indicator plant are shown as colour sketches. This
function helps to identify indicator plants that have
distinct leaf or fruit colour features. If the user taps
the monochromatic sketch in Figure 3, the
characteristic parts of the indicator plant are shown
Figure 2: Screenshot of the remaining 6 types of indicator
plants.
Figure 3: Screenshot of the monochromatic sketch of
characteristics of the indicator plant.
in colour, and a comment describing the
characteristic is displayed at Figure 4. In this colour
sketch, the characteristic red fruit of R. microphyllus
is shown.
A second function is the ability to enlarge the
leaf and fruit sketches of indicator plants. This
feature was included to support the identification
and observation of indicator plants that have
characteristic leaf shapes or leaf veins. If the loupe
icon is tapped at the bottom of Figure 4, an enlarged
leaf is shown. Figure 5 shows the upper side of the
enlarged leaf of R. microphyllus. The characteristic 2
large notches of its leaf are shown. Tapping the x
button at the top right corner of the screen returns
the user to the previous screen (colour sketch).
Third, users are able to examine the backside of
a leaf by rotating the indicator plant leaf. This
feature
may be used to identify and observe
CSEDU2013-5thInternationalConferenceonComputerSupportedEducation
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Figure 4: Screenshot of the colour sketch of characteristics
of the indicator plant.
Figure 5: Screenshot showing the upper side of an
enlarged leaf.
Figure 6: Screenshot showing the backside of an enlarged
leaf.
characteristic leaf shapes and vein structures on the
backside of indicator plants. If a user taps the
enlarged image of the upper side of the leaf in the
Figure 5, an enlarged image of the backside of the
leaf appears. Figure 6 shows the backside of R.
microphyllus leaf. The characteristic white colour of
the backside of the Rubus microphyllus plant leaf
is shown on this screen. Tapping the screen once
more returns the user to the previous screen (upper
side of the leaf).
3 EVALUATION OF THE
‘POCKET PLANT GUIDE’
3.1 Evaluation Method
3.1.1 Purpose
The purpose of evaluation was two-fold: (1) to
determine whether the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ is easy
to use for elementary school students, and (2) to
determine the efficacy of the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ in
supporting elementary school students in identifying
and observing indicator plants.
3.1.2 Subjects
The subjects were 35 elementary school students
(age range: 11–12 years) from an elementary school
attached to a Japanese national university.
3.1.3 Task
The research task was to evaluate the ease-of-use of
the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ and evaluate its efficacy in
supporting the identification and observation of
indicator plants. The questionnaire contained 13
questions, of which 7 were related to the ease-of-use
of the ‘Pocket Plant Guide.’ Sample items included
‘I could easily touch/tap the screen with my
fingertips’ and ‘I could easily manipulate the plant
sketch screen to the more detailed characteristics
screen.’ The remaining 6 items addressed the 3
characteristic functions of the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’
and its efficacy in identifying and observing
indicator plants. For example, with respect to the
coloured sketches of the indicator plants, items such
as ‘the coloured sketches helped me identify the real
plant’ were included. For each of these items,
students were asked to select one of the following 4
options: I think so, I mostly think so, I don’t quite
think so, and I don’t think so. Printed questionnaire
sheets were distributed.
DevelopmentandEvaluationofthe'PocketPlantGuide'toSupporttheObservationandIdentificationofIndicatorPlants
forVegetationSuccession
677
3.1.4 Procedure
The students were divided into groups of 6 and were
asked to identify and observe the 12 types of
indicator plants in the guide. The activity was
conducted indoors. Each student was given the
‘Pocket Plant Guide’ for use. The activity time was
approximately 20 min. After the identification of
indicator plants, the students were asked to answer
the questionnaire, which took approximately 15 min.
The evaluation was conducted on November 17,
2012.
3.2 Results
Table 1 shows the students’ response to each item in
the questionnaire. We interpreted the responses ‘I
think so’ and ‘I mostly think so’ as positive
responses, whereas ‘I don’t quite think so’ and ‘I
don’t think so’ were classified as negative responses.
We then performed Fishers exact test to identify
patterns in the students responses.
First, we discussed the results of the 7 items in
terms of ease-of-use. In 6 out of the 7 items,
significantly more students answered positively than
negatively (p < 0.01). However, for item 6, no
significant differences were observed between the
number of students that answered positively or
negatively (p > 0.10).
Next, we examined the results of the evaluation
for the 6 items related to the guide’s efficacy in
supporting the identification and observation of
indicator plants. For all 6 items, significantly more
students answered positively than negatively (p <
0.01).
4 CONCLUSIONS & FUTURE
WORK
We developed and analysed the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’
in this study. The characteristic functions of this
guide are: (1) the colour display function of leaves
and fruits; (2) the enlargement function of leaves
and fruits; and (3) the backside view of leaves.
First, we discussed the ease-of-use of the guide. The
results of the assessment showed that the number of
positive responses was significantly higher for all
but one item indicating the ease of use of the ‘Pocket
Plant Guide’ by the students. However, no
significant differences between the positive and
negative responses for the questionnaire item ‘I can
easily switch from the enlarged image of leaves and
fruits to the screen showing the plant characteristics.’
were observed. One reason for this was that the
button
to return from the enlarged sketch of leaves
Table 1: Assessment of the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’.
Ease-of-Use ITS IMTS IDQTS IDTS
01 I can easily touch/tap with my fingers ** 14 14 7 0
02 I can easily switch from the plant selection screen to the plant sketch
screen **
25 9 1 0
03 I can easily switch from the plant sketch screen to the screen showing
plant characteristics **
20 12 3 0
04 I can easily switch from the characteristics screen to the enlarged
images of fruits and leaves by tapping the loupe icon **
20 11 4 0
05 I can easily rotate the sketches to view both sides of the leaf ** 18 9 7 1
06 I can easily switch from the enlarged images of leaves and fruits to the
screen with the plant characteristics *
15 7 9 4
07 I can easily switch from the characteristics screen to the plant selection
screen **
25 6 3 1
Effectiveness in plant identification and observation ITS IMTS IDQTS IDTS
[For sketches with coloured plant parts]
08 It helped me to find the real plant ** 27 7 1 0
09 It helped me to observe the real plant and its characteristics in detail ** 24 10 1 0
[ For enlarged sketches of leaves and fruits]
10 It helped me to find the real plant ** 26 8 1 0
11 It helped me to observe the real plant and its characteristics in detail ** 25 10 0 0
[For rotatable images of leaves that allow the student to view both sides]
12 It helped me to find the real plant ** 21 8 5 1
13 It helped me to observe the real plant and its characteristics in detail ** 19 13 2 1
N = 35; **p < 0.01; *n.s: not significant; ITS: I think so; IMTS: I mostly think so; IDQTS: I don’t quite think so; IDTS: I don’t think
so
CSEDU2013-5thInternationalConferenceonComputerSupportedEducation
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and fruits to the screen with their characteristics was
too small. In the future, further improvements to the
interface of ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ will be necessary.
Next, we discussed the efficacy of the guide in
supporting the identification and observation of
indicator plants. For all items, the number of
positive responses was significantly greater. We
speculate that the following 2 factors affected this
outcome: (1) sufficient information was included in
the ‘Pocket Plant Guide’ that allowed the students to
identify indicator plants by the colour of its fruits or
leaves or the shape of the upper and backside of the
leaves; and (2) a sufficiently permissive
environment for the observation of plant
characteristics was obtained through the coloured
and enlarged sketches contained in the guide. On the
basis of these observations, we conclude that the
‘Pocket Plant Guide’ is an effective tool in
supporting the identification and observation of
indicator plants.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This research was supported in part by the
Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B) (No.
23300303).
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DevelopmentandEvaluationofthe'PocketPlantGuide'toSupporttheObservationandIdentificationofIndicatorPlants
forVegetationSuccession
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