How Do Students ‘Really’ Interact with Virtual Worlds?

The Influence of Proper Induction for Virtual Interactions

Athanasios Christopoulos, Marc Conrad and Mitul Shukla

Department of Computer Science & Technology, University of Bedfordshire, Park Square, Luton, U.K.

Keywords: Virtual World, Virtual Learning, Interactions, OpenSimulator, Orientation, Induction, Engagement.

Abstract: Our ongoing research focuses on the ways that interactions affect learner engagement with a virtual world

and, consequently, the educational activities that take place within it when a hybrid learning approach is

used. It aims to form a complete taxonomy of the types of interactions that can lead to the development of

engaging and interactive learning experiences. In this paper, we examine the impact that the orientation

(induction) process has on learner engagement by observing a cohort of postgraduate students while using

an OpenSim-based institutionally hosted virtual world. The results of our study highlight that educators and

instructors need to plan their in-world learning activities very carefully and with a focus on interactions if

engaging activities are what they want to offer their students. Additionally, it seems that student interactions

with the content of the virtual world and the in-class student-to-student interactions have stronger impact on

student engagement when hybrid methods are used. We confirm and further enhance our hypothesis

investigating student feelings and thoughts about the interaction taking place within a virtual world when

that is used in higher education.

1 INTRODUCTION

Computer supported education can be classified in

four different ways (see Table 1). Virtual reality and

virtual worlds, which were first introduced to the

public in the 1980s and have continued to develop

ever since, are cornerstones of “learning in

technology” (Herbet et al., 2012; Schrader, 2008).

Table 1: The framework of Schrader (2008).

Relations of Technology with Education

Learning about technology

Learning with

technology

Technology as a topic Technology as a tool

Learning from Technology Learning in technology

Technology as a delivery

mechanism

Technology as the

context

In the literature (Frutos-Perez, 2010; Herbet et

al., 2012), virtual worlds are defined as 2D or 3D

computer generated environments that either depict

parts of the physical world or imaginary sceneries.

In these worlds, users are able to perform a wide

range of interactions with the content of the world

and other users (Dickey, 2005) such as: object

creation (Allison et al., 2012; Dalgarno and Lee,

2010), object manipulation (Bredl et al., 2012;

Dalgarno and Lee, 2010), terrain editing (Allison et

al., 2012), navigation around the world (Allison et

al., 2012; Dalgarno and Lee, 2010; Herbet et al.,

2012; Hockey et al., 2010; Johnson et al., 2009),

communication synchronously or asynchronously,

either orally or via chat, and. finally, using avatar

gestures and other forms of in-world visual

interactions (Bredl et al., 2012; Carter, 2012;

Dalgarno and Lee, 2010; Herbet et al., 2012; Hockey

et al., 2010; Johnson et al., 2009).

These kinds of interactions are performed

through the use of avatars (Allison et al., 2012;

Bredl et al., 2012; Herbet et al., 2012; Johnson,

Vorderstrasse and Shaw, 2009), that is, users’

artificial figures (Conrad, 2010; Dickey, 2005). The

fact that virtual worlds provide the necessary context

for all those interactions mentioned, not to mention

that they are increasingly providing more complex

interactions, has led educators to use them

extensively, taking into account all their educational

potentials (Schrader, 2008). Content creation

activities, exploratory, problem-based, collaborative,

blended, and synchronous or asynchronous distance

learning are only some of the few in world

educational paradigms that have been extensively

Christopoulos, A., Conrad, M. and Shukla, M.

How Do Students ‘Really’ Interact with Virtual Worlds? - The Inﬂuence of Proper Induction for Virtual Interactions.

In Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Computer Supported Education (CSEDU 2016) - Volume 1, pages 43-54

ISBN: 978-989-758-179-3

used and studied from many different perspectives

(Carter, 2012; Dickey, 2005; Hockey et al., 2010;

Vosinakis, Koutsabasis and Anastassakis, 2014).

Despite some differentiations on recent researchers’

foci (Dede, 1995; Minocha and Tingle, 2008;

Veletsianos, 2009; Padrós, Romero and Usart,

2012), all of them have acknowledged Vygotsky’s

Social Constructivist Learning Theory (Vygotsky,

1978) to have great practical application on learning

within virtual worlds. According to Social

Constructivist Learning Theory (Vygotsky, 1978),

students construct their cognitive structures through

interactions, and engagement in any kind of activity

that motivates them to learn. Thus, interacting within

virtual worlds can be very beneficial for learners

(Dalgarno and Lee, 2010). The author in (Jones,

2013) underlines that it is the learners’ ability to

affect, alter, and enhance, according to their needs,

the content of the virtual world they learn in that

enables them to construct their cognitive schemes

and engage with the phenomena they study.

Consequently, learning becomes more self-directed

and student-centred (Anasol et al., 2012), whilst the

educators get the role of designer, instructor, and

supporter of activities that aim to engage students in

learning (Anasol et al., 2012; Schrader, 2008).

The historic context of these studies derives from

the plethora of research activities into Second Life

since 2003 (including research at the University of

Bedfordshire such as Shukla and Conrad (2011) or

Christopoulos and Conrad (2012) ) and subsequent

research on OpenSim in view of the similarities and

differences identified (Christopoulos and Conrad,

2013). We freely acknowledge that other interfaces

such as textual virtual environments exist; however

they are not in the focus of this study.

Several frameworks have been developed to aid

educators define and conceptualise their new role

and the potential utilisation of virtual worlds in

educational contexts (Elliot et al., 2012).

Most of them focus on the interactivity of the

worlds or the interactions that can be developed in

order to cover students’ learning needs. Camilleri et

al. (2013) studied in-world interactions in detail

aiming to explain how students learn in-world but

disregarded the perspective of learning in the

physical classroom, focusing on the viewpoint of

distance-learning. Likewise, de Freitas et al. (2009),

investigating the use of virtual worlds for distance

learning, suggested a four dimensional framework

for the evaluation of student learning experiences.

Those dimensions (see Table 2) are learners’

dimension, pedagogic dimension, representational

dimension, and contextual dimension. Even though

in-world interactions were part of their study, the

focus was not exclusively on that aspect, since they

aimed to give a more holistic view of the

affordances of distance education in virtual worlds.

Table 2: The framework of de Freitas et al. (2009).

Four Dimensional Framework

Learner Specifics Pedagogy

Profile

Role

Competencies

Associative

Cognitive

Social / Situative

Representation Context

Fidelity

Interactivity

Immersion

Environment

Access to learning

Supporting resources

At this point a question, regarding the way in-

world interactions are being developed in cases

where learners are simultaneously co-present in the

physical classroom and in the virtual world, arose.

Another interesting point of de Freita’s et al.

framework (de Freitas et al., 2009) is that it takes

into consideration a “learner’s dimension”. Thus, the

answer that will be provided through our study will

supplement the aforementioned framework and

analyse how engagement occurs as a synergy or

component between the learner’s personal choices

and preconceptions, on the one hand, and the

instructional designer’s plans, on the other.

Childs (2010) who investigated the skills

students acquire when they start using virtual

worlds, formed a taxonomy of interactions related to

the use of virtual words (see Table 3). He divided

interactions into four categories: interacting with the

world, interacting with others, interacting with the

avatar, and finally finding and searching.

Table 3: Child’s (2010) taxonomy of interactions.

Interacting with the world Interacting with others

Motion

Manoeuvring

Way-finding

Changing camera positions

Mouselook (first-person)

Using local (public) chat

Using private chat

Using the minimap to find

people and move to them

Interacting with the avatar Finding & searching

Changing avatar appearance

Creating folders to save

appearances

Animating the avatar

Creating a landmark

Finding a landmark in the

inventory

Teleporting to a new location

and back again

However, this taxonomy did not include the

interactions between students and the content of the

virtual world, nor the building and scripting skills

students usually need to acquire, since this subject

was out of the scope of his study. This issue is

intended to be covered in this study.

CSEDU 2016 - 8th International Conference on Computer Supported Education

Chafer and Childs (2008) identified the elements

that affect a world’s interactivity, that is,

manipulability, reciprocation, and responsiveness.

Addressing the same topic from a different angle,

Steuer (1992) noted three alternative factors when

examining interactivity: speed, range, and mapping

of interactions. These two different frameworks can

be helpful tools for educators who need to measure

how interactive their existing virtual environments

are. One of the few researchers looking at the

educational use of virtual worlds both from the

inside and from the outside, both in-world and in-

class, is that of Levesque and Lelievre (2011).

Specifically, they presented the outcome of their

experiment on applying a hybrid approach, where

students were simultaneously present in-class and

in-world. They pointed out that students’ virtual and

physical co-location led to the development of a

complex network of interactions both in-world and

in-class, both among students and between students

and the virtual environment. Although Levesque and

Lelievre (2011) studied interactions quite

extensively, they did not identify how interactions

are linked to engagement. This is another issue that

this study aims to investigate.

De Freitas et al., (2010) underline the need for

further investigation of the potential and the

affordances of hybrid spaces with simultaneous

student physical and virtual presence. In addition,

Elliott et al., (2012) point out a lack of a detailed

taxonomy of all the interactions related to the use of

virtual worlds in an educational context.

To sum up, this study aims to fill the gaps

highlighted in the literature and provide educators’

who aim to include the use of virtual worlds in their

educational agenda with instructions on how to

design and develop engaging and interactive

learning activities. Even though learners’ choices

and preconceptions regarding the use of virtual

worlds have been investigated extensively in the

literature, the impact of the synergy between the

learners’ personal choices and the instructional

designers’ plans is blurred. Furthermore, the existing

literature is mostly focusing on the in-world

interactions aiming to create effective e-learning

models, but it lacks detailed frameworks exploring

the relationship between the interactions in hybrid-

learning models and learner engagement with the

learning material and the educational activities.

2 MATERIALS & METHODS

Primarily two research methods were used,

observations and surveys. This was thought to be the

most appropriate way to examine the subject under

investigation since it would give a more thorough

view of the phenomena, aid validity and diversity,

and allow for the triangulation of the primary data.

In other words, observations would allow us to

record student actions and behaviour both in the

physical classroom and in the virtual world, whilst

surveys provide the opportunity to record student

preferences.

In this paper we will examine the findings

derived from the observatory study.

2.1 Observation

Research through observation may have several

strengths (Cohen et al., 2011). However, there were

three main aspects that indicated observation as the

most suitable method for this study. Firstly, what is

considered to be the most essential advantage of

observation is the principles of “immediate

awareness” and “direct cognition” — i.e. the

opportunity given to a researcher to have a “direct

look” at the actions that take place without having to

rely on second-hand accounts — as described in

(Cohen et al., 2011) that lead to the emergence of

unique primary data. Secondly, it is a very flexible

form of data collection that allows researchers to

alter their focus, depending on the observed actions

and behaviours. Finally, the method of observation

allows the researcher to gather any necessary data,

whilst the participants unimpeded follow their own

agenda and priorities.

2.2 Experiment Structure & Sample

This research was conducted in a university based

environment with a cohort of postgraduate students

who volunteered to be part of this study during their

weekly practical session. A university hosted virtual

world, based on the OpenSimulator architecture, was

used to allow students to explore and familiarize

themselves with the Linden Scripting Language —

an event driven programming paradigm — and also

3D modelling concepts.

The aforementioned cohort of students utilised

the virtual world as an innovative tool to deal with,

in the context of working and collaborating in

groups with task division, similar to circumstances

taking place in companies. Each group had to choose

an emerging technology subject, research that

subject, create a virtual showcase for its promotion,

How Do Students ‘Really’ Interact with Virtual Worlds? - The Inﬂuence of Proper Induction for Virtual Interactions

and document all the aspects of their work. During

these practical sessions students were

simultaneously co-present in the physical classroom

and in the virtual world (Table 4 – Table 6). For

more information about the assignment setup the

reader is directed to Christopoulos, Conrad and

Shukla (2014).

Table 4: Observations’ sample.

Observation 1 2 3 4 5 6

Students 17 15 16 11 13 10

Table 5: Sample’s identity.

Observation 1 2 3 4 5 6

Male 10 8 9 5 8 6

Female 7 7 7 6 5 4

Table 6: Students’ prior experience with Virtual worlds

like Second Life/OpenSimulator.

None 7

Up to a week 5

Up to a month 2

More than six months but less than a year 1

More than one year 2

A narrative approach, as described in (Cohen et

al., 2011), was considered to be the most suitable for

the analysis of this data set. Through this approach,

student behaviour, choices, and actions could be

studied in the context in which they took place.

Thus, narratives were in logical structures rather

than in a chronological order.

2.3 Experiment’s Overview & Setup

Many new users are either simply unable to acquire

the navigation and operation mechanisms of virtual

worlds, or refuse to do so because they consider this

practice as a waste of time and effort, with no

practical value (Childs, 2010). When a virtual world

is to be used for educational purposes, time is

essential to be devoted to the students’

familiarisation with the world in order to enable

them to form their avatar, and by extension their

virtual identity, and also learn to interact

fundamentally with the virtual environment, as

reported by Childs (2010) and De Freitas et al.

(2009). Additionally, De Freitas et al. (2009) note

that the realisation of these procedures, which on the

whole they call “orientation”, requires that specific

actions be undertaken under the supervision and

assistance of the educator in charge.

Therefore, in this experiment the focus was on

the impact that the orientation (induction) process

has on learners’ actions, interactions and

engagement with the virtual world and the learning

material.

It is worth mentioning that even though having

different control groups (e.g. a cohort of student who

would go through the orientation process whereas

the second group would not) would be desirable, it

was not feasible to establish this due to the students

perceiving they might be disadvantaged as far as

their learning experience is concerned.

3 RESULTS

A semi-structured observational checklist (Cohen et

al., 2011) was used for the collection of primary

data. This checklist included sixteen (16) focus

points (F1-F16) regarding the interactions taking

place in the physical classroom, when a virtual

world is used, seventeen (17) focus points (F17-F34)

regarding the interactions taking place in-world, not

only among students but between the students and

the virtual world as well, and, finally, six (6) focus

points (F35-F40) regarding students’ willingness to

remain in the virtual world and, by extension, in the

physical classroom. Any remarkable detail of the

observation was noted in the open part of the

checklist. Observations were taking place on a

weekly basis and lasted six (6) weeks. Students were

simultaneously co-present both in the physical

(university) classroom and in the virtual world,

whilst each practical session was lasting for 2 hours

(12 hours in total). In order to observe all the

participants for an equal amount of time, students’

actions were observed in rotation for approximately

30 seconds until the completion of the practical

session.

3.1 Actions & Interactions in the

Physical Classroom

Aiming to group the observed data in a more

efficient and meaningful way, following the

principles of Grounded Theory (Cohen et al., 2011),

the aforementioned focus points for the first

fundamental category are grouped in three sub-

categories (see Sections 3.1.1 – 3.1.3).

3.1.1 Students’ in-Class Talking and

Making Comments about the Virtual

World

Students’ communication in the physical classroom

includes eight (8) focus points and their frequencies

are illustrated in Table 7.

CSEDU 2016 - 8th International Conference on Computer Supported Education

Table 7: Students’ in-class talking and making comments

about the virtual world.

Week F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7 F8

1 154 27 14 15 8 0 14 3

2 103 17 96 0 0 0 31 0

3 87 43 105 7 4 0 4 9

4 91 26 71 26 0 4 0 0

5 78 17 93 11 0 0 0 6

6 41 35 43 27 5 0 3 0

F1. Student talks to classmate about the project or

the virtual world

F2. Student talks to classmate about something

irrelevant to the project or the virtual world

F3. Student talks to tutor/demonstrator about the

project or the virtual world

F4. Student talks to tutor/demonstrator about

something irrelevant to the project or the virtual

world

F5. Student makes a positive comment about the

technology of the virtual world

F6. Student makes a negative comment about the

technology of the virtual world

F7. Student makes a positive comment about the

emotional experience of the virtual world

F8. Student makes a negative comment about the

emotional experience of the virtual world

Even though students were usually discussing

matters related to the virtual world, the focus was

not always necessarily on their task or assignment.

Building and scripting were fairly often the highlight

of students’ conversations although several times

students were observed discussing the use of third

party software to import 3D objects. Indeed, several

times they were also observed discussing matters

outside the scope of their project, though related to

the use of the virtual world, such as its accessibility

using portable devices (tablets) or the inclusion of

this platform in other university classes. However, a

few students were almost always detached from the

classroom and, by extension their project and the

virtual world, discussing completely irrelevant

matters during the practical sessions.

Overall, during the first practical sessions it was

observed that some students’ negative

preconceptions were quite strong, yet this gradually

changed over time. In detail, most of the students

were observed discussing positively the opportunity

given to them to experience a completely different

way to do programming and also get a hint of how

3D development works. On the other hand, some

students were making negative comments about the

technology mainly related to the quality of the

graphics or the functionality of the scripting

language claiming that, due to the lack of prior

experience with such a programming language, they

had to spend a considerable amount of time in order

to familiarise themselves with it. As a result and as

the submission deadline was due, they did not have

enough time to produce something meaningful for

their assignment. There were, however, also a few

students who expressed a completely different

opinion claiming that the use of the virtual world

had nothing to offer, as this specific programming

language is being used exclusively in such virtual

environments.

Finally, while reaching the completion of this

project, students were observed discussing matters

not related to the virtual world focusing mainly on

other aspects of their project. This, then brings into

question the longevity of the intrinsic interest and/or

attractiveness to virtual worlds that these students

had outside of the class requirements.

3.1.2 Student Attitude towards the Use of

the Virtual World

Students’ attitude towards the use of the virtual

world includes four (4) focus points and their

frequencies are illustrated in Table 8.

F9. Student seems focused on his/her project

F10. Student seems to enjoy the project

F11. Student seems ‘absent-minded’

F12. Student seems displeased using the virtual

world

Table 8: Student attitude towards the use of the virtual

world.

Week F9 F10 F11 F12

1 17 29 0 29

2 147 68 0 17

3 113 49 9 3

4 154 57 0 27

5 126 39 0 41

6 136 57 0 19

Students experienced various feelings in a

spectrum ranging from happiness and enjoyment to

confusion, displeasure and disappointment. Each one

of these feelings affected their interactions and

engagement with the virtual world in diverse ways.

More often than not, they were quite focused and

seemed to enjoy their time working within the

virtual world regardless of their decision to work in

groups or alone. However, the difficulty of

manipulating virtual objects or non-functional

scripts led to high levels of disappointment and

affected engagement in two rather opposite ways, as

some students opted to spend more time improving

their work whilst others gave up. Quite rarely

How Do Students ‘Really’ Interact with Virtual Worlds? - The Inﬂuence of Proper Induction for Virtual Interactions

students were observed being absent-minded but, at

certain points, their conscious decision to not work

on their own task but, instead, help their fellow-

students with other tasks (usually not related to the

virtual world) led most of them to be completely

detached from it. Finally, a small portion of students

were observed constantly performing actions not

relevant to the virtual world or their project. It is

worth mentioning that students who decided to work

alone were slightly less engaged with the virtual

world compared to those who were working in

groups helping and influencing each other.

During the course of these observations it

became apparent that the levels of engagement

students had with the virtual world differed

completely from the levels of engagement they had

with the actual project/task. Specifically, most of

them spent considerably more time finding scripts

on the web and less time developing their own, as

the former was one of the main reasons for using the

virtual world. Nevertheless, what attracted their

attention more and resulted in higher levels of

engagement, primarily with the virtual world and

consequently with their project, was the design and

the development process of 3D objects.

A few students decided to design their 3D

objects using third-party software and consequently

import them in the virtual world. This is, indeed, an

example of almost complete lack of engagement

with the virtual world, while the focus was

exclusively on achieving good results with regard to

their assignment. In any case, higher levels of

engagement, both with the virtual world and with the

project, were observed after the third observation

and that fact is an indication that higher levels of

engagement were achieved as a result of the time

spent in-world and the experience in the use of a

virtual world.

3.1.3 Student Identity and Avatar Identity

The way students referred to their avatars while

being in the physical classroom included four (4)

focus points and their frequencies are illustrated in

Table 9.

F13. Student refers to avatar in the first person /

identifies with avatar (avatar as ‘Ι’)

F14. Student refers to avatar in the second person /

addresses avatar directly (avatar as ‘you’)

F15. Student refers to avatar in the third person

(avatar as ‘him’ or ‘her’)

F16. Student refers to avatar as object (avatar as

‘it’)

Table 9: Student identity and avatar identity.

Week F13 F14 F15 F16

1 9 0 4 0

2 6 3 0 0

3 4 2 2 0

4 2 0 0 0

5 0 0 0 0

6 0 0 0 0

Figure 1: Snapshot from the avatars’ appearance editing

process in the orientation area.

Most of the students perceived avatars as the

medium to mirror their physical identity including

their gender, body shape and ethnicity or hair style.

These changes ranged from the very basic to the

more extended ones, with only a few students hiding

their real identity by choosing to modify their

avatars using either the opposite gender or a non-

human shape (robots, aliens). Even though avatar

modification was very intense during the first

practical sessions, several students were observed

modifying their avatars’ appearance during the

whole course of observations.

References to avatars were generally very

infrequent and rare even during the first

observations. Students were referring to avatars

mainly in the first person and considerably less in

the third, whilst even more infrequent were the

references made to avatars as objects. Furthermore,

most of the references made to avatars – or to

students – were positive, with the only exception of

a student who maintained an overall disruptive

attitude both through the modification of his avatar

and his behaviour, resulting, thus, in receiving

negative comments from other students.

CSEDU 2016 - 8th International Conference on Computer Supported Education

Figure 2: Overview of the sandbox next to the orientation

building.

3.2 Actions & Interactions in the

Virtual World

The aforementioned focus points for the second

fundamental category concerning students’ actions

and interactions in the virtual world are grouped in

four sub-categories (see Sections 3.2.1-3.2.4).

3.2.1 Students’ in-World Talking and

Making Comments about the Virtual

World

Students’ communication in the virtual world

includes seven (7) focus points and their frequencies

are illustrated in Table 10. The term ‘chat’

mentioned below refers exclusively to typewritten

communication.

F17. Student chats with classmate about the project

or the virtual world

F18. Student chats with student about something

irrelevant to the project or the virtual world

F19. Student uses in chat phrases / words revealing

enjoyment

F20. Student uses in chat words / phrases revealing

exclamation

F21. Student uses in chat words/ phrases often

used is social networks

F22. Student makes a negative comment about the

technology of the virtual world

F23. Student makes a negative comment about the

emotional experience of the virtual world

The use of the chat tool was very limited or almost

non-existent for some students as they were

observed having their chat window closed or

minimised most of the time. Only a few students

opted to use it in order to greet their fellow-students,

mainly during the first observations, or to express

their feelings about the avatars’ appearance. Other

than that, extensive use of the chat tool was

observed only when it was absolutely necessary

(distance communication while being in the virtual

world, scripts testing). In addition, only a few times

were students observed using social media slang.

Their unwillingness to use the chat-tool can be

attributed either to the fact that they were physically

co-located and, therefore, there was no essential

need to communicate with others using the chat tool,

or, as several students mentioned, when they were

not co-located they could use Skype or any other

VoIP tool for their communication needs. In fact, the

lack of a VoIP tool that would be embedded to the

virtual world was pointed out several times by most

of the students.

Table 10: Students’ in-world talking and making

comments about the virtual world.

Week F17 F18 F19 F20 F21 F22 F23

1 28 14 9 11 7 0 0

2 7 2 0 0 0 0 0

3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

3.2.2 Student Identity and Avatar Identity

The way students referred to their avatars while

being in the virtual world included five (5) focus

points. Their frequencies are illustrated in Table 11.

F24. Student modifies avatar appearance

F25. Student refers to avatar in the first person /

identifies with avatar

F26. Student refers to avatar in the second person /

addresses avatar directly

F27. Student refers to avatar in the third person

F28. Student refers to avatar as an object

Table 11: Student identity & avatar identity.

Week F24 F25 F26 F27 F28

1 98 1 1 0 0

2 16 0 0 0 0

3 12 0 0 0 0

4 0 0 0 0 0

5 0 0 0 0 0

6 0 0 0 0 0

The more engaged students were with the virtual

world, the keener they became to make further, more

complex and detailed modifications to their avatars’

appearance. Indeed, modification of their avatars’

appearance was the first type of interaction that most

of the students had both with the virtual world and

with each other. Interestingly, a considerable

number of students were observed modifying their

How Do Students ‘Really’ Interact with Virtual Worlds? - The Inﬂuence of Proper Induction for Virtual Interactions

avatars’ appearance while located next to the

corresponding area in the orientation building. As

already mentioned, most of the students opted to

modify their avatar in a way that it resembled their

real appearance. Despite the fact that everyone was

aware of their real identity, their willingness to role-

play increased the levels of enjoyment that students

could get from the ludic side of the virtual world and

positively affected the levels of their engagement. A

very small portion of students were observed not

identifying themselves with their avatars at all as

they treated them merely as a feature of the virtual

world with minor or no importance. Finally, the

references made to avatars using the chat tool were

considerably limited.

3.2.3 In-World Nonverbal Communication

One of the alternative ways of communication that

virtual worlds offer is nonverbal communication

(avatar gestures and emoticons). Therefore, this

category includes two (2) focus points, F29 and F30

and Table 12 presents their frequencies.

F29. Student uses avatar gestures

F30. Student uses emoticons

Figure 3: Information about the in-world nonverbal

communication tools.

Table 12: In-world non-verbal communication.

Week F29 F30

1 34 0

2 0 0

3 0 0

4 0 0

5 0 0

6 0 0

Part of the orientation area had been dedicated to

the creation and use of avatar gestures. Nevertheless,

not all students were observed visiting the

orientation area and that leads to the assumption that

they were probably unaware of this tool. In addition,

the decision of nearly all students to not use the non-

verbal communication channels can also be

attributed by the fact that they were physically co-

located. Thus, very few students opted to use them

and in most cases their animations were random and

undetermined. Likewise, fairly rare was the use of

emoticons, whilst none of the students were

observed wearing animated objects.

3.2.4 Interactions with the World

Even though the main reason for using a virtual

world was for teaching and learning purposes, the

fact that students’ attention can be distracted by

other stimuli could not be disregarded, and,

therefore, this category, consisted of four (4) focus

points, including the various types of interactions

that students had while being in the virtual world;

Table 13 illustrates their frequencies.

F31. Student works on project

F32. Student performs actions irrelevant to the

project

F33. Student explores classmate’s virtual artefacts

F34. Student uses own virtual creations

Table 13: Interactions with the world.

Week F31 F32 F33 F34

1 0 107 21 66

2 35 82 17 57

3 76 46 13 73

4 107 19 8 61

5 126 4 3 86

6 73 0 7 39

Interactions played an important role in student

engagement, even though not all of them were

equally intense. Specifically, very few students

opted to create their own scripts; instead, the vast

majority were observed using or modifying premade

scripts which can be found on the web. Contrary to

that, most of them spent a considerable amount of

time designing their own 3D objects. The

opportunities for exploration, especially during the

first practical sessions, were considerably limited as

the only content available in the virtual world were

the orientation and sandbox areas. Students were

observed visiting other students’ workspaces mainly

to get ideas for their work. At this point it should be

mentioned that some students, in an attempt to

prevent others from copying their ideas, decided to

block the access points of their workspaces. This

reduced the opportunities for interactions with other

students and, therefore, with the content of the

virtual world, despite the fact that the workspaces

CSEDU 2016 - 8th International Conference on Computer Supported Education

were designed in a way that would enhance in-world

interactions between students.

Almost all students went through the orientation

process and spent a considerable amount of time

using the objects, following the instructions and

interacting with their fellow students and content of

this area, The students who decided to go through

this process adapted more readily to work and

collaborate with others, whilst those who

disregarded it, partially or completely, were

observed struggling. Moreover, they were quite

often addressing questions to the teaching team

which could have been answered after having

properly oriented themselves. Nevertheless, during

the course of the observations, several students were

observed visiting the orientation area after being

advised to do so by their fellow students.

Finally, students would not opt to follow the

rules that had been set ‘unofficially’ to maintain a

stable virtual environment (e.g. building and

scripting on the allocated areas). Thus, it is

questionable whether engagement was affected by

the fact that students truly believed that this tool had

an educational impact or whether the virtual world

was simply a place to have fun and work on the task

assigned to them.

3.3 Students’ Willingness to Remain

in-World

The final sub-category, consisting of five (5) focus

points, concerns students’ willingness to use the

virtual world for additional time while being

physically located in the physical classroom (Table

14 illustrates their frequencies).

F35. Student ‘logs-in’ before the beginning of the

practical session.

F36. Student ‘logs-in’ at the beginning of the

practical session.

F37. Student ‘logs-in’ later than the beginning of

the practical session.

F38. Student ‘logs-out’ before the end of the

practical session.

F39. Student ‘logs-out’ right after the end of the

practical session.

F40. Student stays in-world after the end of the

practical session.

In most cases students would follow the schedule

that had been set for the practical session, entering

and leaving the virtual world just on time. Only a

few students opted to remain online longer or go

online beforehand and that happened just a few

times during the whole course of the observations.

However, it should be noted that their interactions

were not always related to the virtual world or their

task within it.

Table 14: Students’ willingness to remain in-world longer

than the expected.

Week F35 F36 F37 F38 F39 F40

1 1 16 0 0 12 5

2 0 15 0 0 11 4

3 0 9 7 0 16 0

4 0 11 0 0 8 3

5 0 13 0 0 13 0

6 0 10 0 0 6 4

4 DISCUSSION

The impact that the orientation process had on

learner engagement – while using a hybrid virtual

learning approach – was clearly positive as it also

enhanced the opportunities for interaction between

the students and the virtual world. This is evidenced

when considering focus points F9, F11, F24 and

F31. Those who went through the orientation

process were keener on interacting both with their

fellow students and the virtual world, considering

focus points F1, F17, F24 and F33, the same

students used the in-world tools more intensively as

seen in focus points F17-F34. They also found the

whole process more enjoyable, constructive and

rewarding, as observed in focus points F5-F8, F10-

F11, F22-24, and F33-F34. On the other hand, those

students who disregarded partially or even

completely the existence of the orientation area,

were almost constantly struggling to deal with the

virtual world, and, by extension, their assignment as

seen in F3, F6, F8, F23 (even though this can be

attributed to the lack of information regarding the

programming process) and F32. Likewise, students

who followed the instructions regarding the avatar

modification process – though with some exceptions

– were usually having considerably more intense

modifications on their avatars compared to others, as

revealed in the F24 focus point. Nevertheless, the

references made to avatars were overall limited most

likely because of the fact that they did not consider

them as a special feature of the virtual world but

rather as a tool to work on their project. The

opportunity given to students to be co-present both

in the virtual world and in the physical classroom

simultaneously resulted in a limited use of the chat-

tool or any other nonverbal communication method

in the virtual world, since this need was covered

primarily in the physical classroom, as clearly

How Do Students ‘Really’ Interact with Virtual Worlds? - The Inﬂuence of Proper Induction for Virtual Interactions

observed in F1-F4, F7-F8, F17-23, and F29-F30.

Furthermore, most of the students were working on

their task without being distracted or struggling due

to the fact that they had all the necessary knowledge-

base to deal with the tools of the virtual world and,

by extension, their project as seen in F9, F11-F12

and F31-F34. Finally, students’ willingness to stay

in the virtual world and the physical classroom for

extra time, for the whole course of the practical

session or even longer than expected is also an

important indication that confirms their engagement

with the virtual world and their project as seen in

F35-40.

Summarising the aforementioned focus-points

and considering the stakeholders who have different

interests and responsibilities to the use of virtual

worlds, the following suggestions are given:

Instructional Designers should always ensure that a

proper induction process will be provided to learners

in order to help them understand quickly and deeply

the mechanisms of the virtual world, as this is the

key to increase the chances of having successful

learning activities and the desired outcomes.

Educators should provide enough time to learners

to undertake the orientation process for a proper

induction and familiarisation with the virtual world

and its tools.

Students should be encouraged to use and engage

with this process as this will also help them to

achieve better results – in terms of their assignment

– and also work within the virtual world effortlessly.

Future Researchers, should focus on designing

different setups of induction processes that will fit

the personalities of different learners (in terms of

their learning style) and their perspectives as well as

the levels of education considering that this

experiment conducted in university level students.

5 CONCLUSIONS

The orientation process contributed positively to

students’ smooth induction and that resulted in

having meaningful and engaging interactions.

Furthermore, students’ simultaneous co-existence in

both environments eliminated the drawbacks of each

educational approach and broadened the network of

interactions. It is, however, of vital importance that

educators provide students with clear instructions

and information about the existence and purpose of

the in-world educational content and encourage their

learners to use it.

As already discussed in the literature, many

studies focus exclusively on interactions that take

place within the virtual world where the

environment provides the primary medium for

communication and interaction (Childs, 2010; de

Freitas et al., 2010; Herbet et al., 2012; Hockey et

al., 2010; Johnson et al., 2009). Others have set the

focus on the impact that avatars have on the in-world

interactions (Allison et al., 2012; Bredl et al., 2012;

Herbet et al., 2012; Johnson, Vorderstrasse and

Shaw, 2009). Many frameworks have also been

developed to classify the different ways of teaching

and learning in virtual worlds (de Freitas et al.,

2009; Schrader, 2008). Nevertheless, the main

contribution of our study is that it examines

interactions in conjunction with their impact to

learners’ engagement, in the context of using an

orientation process to enhance learners’ familiarity

with the virtual world and boost the opportunities for

more intense interactions and therefore, higher levels

of engagement. Future work arising from this study

might include:

• Development of virtual educational games to

observe students’ interactions mainly with other

students in the context of a student competition.

• Development of artificial intelligent agents

(Non-Person Characters) to observe students’

interactions mainly with the content of the virtual

world.

• Further identification of factors that make an

orientation area successful.

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