Faculty dissatisfaction with diminishing levels of student engagement in lifestyle medicine sessions prompted this exploratory project that compared differences in students' substantive engagement in ...medical preclinical and clinical level lifestyle medicine sessions. The preclinical and clinical level sessions had the same learning objectives and learning tasks, properly aligned with that level of student learning, but were offered in different learning formats, either traditional classroom approaches or technology-enhanced approaches. At the preclinical level, we transferred a nonmandatory, face-to-face session to a nonmandatory, fully online session. At the clinical level, we introduced two novel technology tools. We utilized Zoom technologies, which afforded students the ability to access the session from anywhere, and employed Hickey's use of "promoting" student submissions as one method for increasing student-student interaction during the synchronous session. We used indicators of behavioral engagement of Henrie et al. (Henrie CR, Halverson LR, Graham CR.
90: 36-53, 2015) as the framework for determining applicable engagement behaviors, including attendance, assignment completion, interactions (responding/feedback/endorsements), and the quality of (and faculty satisfaction with) the face-to-face and/or online interactions. We expected to observe higher levels of engagement behaviors in the technology-enhanced approach and found that to be the case at both the preclinical and clinical levels, in both mandatory/nonmandatory and synchronous/asynchronous formats. However, it was the increase in both the level and substance of the students' interactions in the technology-enhanced sessions that provided surprising results. A review of the sessions with enhanced engagement highlight the role of student autonomy, a construct with strongly established associations to student motivation and engagement.
Although augmented reality (AR) has gained much research attention in recent years, the term AR was given different meanings by varying researchers. In this article, we first provide an overview of ...definitions, taxonomies, and technologies of AR. We argue that viewing AR as a concept rather than a type of technology would be more productive for educators, researchers, and designers. Then we identify certain features and affordances of AR systems and applications. Yet, these compelling features may not be unique to AR applications and can be found in other technological systems or learning environments (e.g., ubiquitous and mobile learning environments). The instructional approach adopted by an AR system and the alignment among technology design, instructional approach, and learning experiences may be more important. Thus, we classify three categories of instructional approaches that emphasize the “roles,” “tasks,” and “locations,” and discuss what and how different categories of AR approaches may help students learn. While AR offers new learning opportunities, it also creates new challenges for educators. We outline technological, pedagogical, learning issues related to the implementation of AR in education. For example, students in AR environments may be cognitively overloaded by the large amount of information they encounter, the multiple technological devices they are required to use, and the complex tasks they have to complete. This article provides possible solutions for some of the challenges and suggests topics and issues for future research.
► We argue that viewing AR as a concept rather than a technology is more productive. ► We identify features and affordances of AR systems and applications. ► The instructional approaches adopted by an AR system are discussed. ► While AR offers new learning opportunities, it also creates new challenges. ► We provide solutions for challenges and suggest directions for future research.
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