Large multi-touch screens to enhance collaboration in the classroom of the 21st century: an Italian experiment

Alessandra Agostini, Elisa Di Biase
pp. 40-56, download

Abstract

Thanks to technology-pervaded learning environments, digital natives can experiment new engaging ways of learning together at school. In particular, large displays with multi-touch technology hold new opportunities for the learning process, through the dialogic interaction between students and the simultaneous physical interaction with the screen. Our research suggests the use of a context-aware platform with multi-touch displays to support digital storytelling, in order to increase students’ involvement, motivation, and participation. We start our work by designing an application to create fairytales using multi-touch screens, to stimulate new collaboration opportunities during everyday classroom activities. The paper presents the results of an experiment with Interactive WhiteBoards (IWBs), carried out in an Italian primary school.

keywords: Collaborative learning, participative learning, multi-touch technology, single-display groupware, technology-enhanced education, IWBs.

 

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