Building Educational Virtual Environments

1
Building Educational Virtual Environments

• C. Bouras, and T. Tsiatsos
• Computer Engineering and Informatics Department,
  University of Patras
• and
• Research Academic Computer Technology Institute,
  GREECE
• tsiatsos_at_cti.gr, ru6.cti.gr

2
Introduction

• This paper presents the Educational Virtual
  Environments (EVE) prototype, which integrates a
  variety of communication and collaboration tools
  to support Collaborative Virtual Environments
  (CVE) focused on collaborative e-learning

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Educational Virtual Environment

• An Educational Virtual Environment (EVE) is a
  Collaborative Virtual Environments (CVEs) that
  support collaboration and interaction among users
  for educational purposes

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Why CVEs for collaborative e-learning?

• because they
• offer the advantages of nearness and social
  presence through a shared virtual space populated
  by avatars
• can support non-verbal communication through
  avatar gestures, facial expressions during a
  collaborative e-learning session
• are more suitable for collaborative e-learning
  than videoconferencing tools (which target mainly
  in frontal learning)
• can support many people at the same time in the
  same virtual place
• can simulate tools that are located in a
  traditional classroom (such as card moderation
  boards and whiteboards)

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EVE prototype

• It simulates a classroom giving the users
  communication and collaboration capabilities and
  necessary tools for realizing collaborative
  e-learning scenarios
• It is based on a multi-user platform for
  networked virtual environment implemented using
  VRML and Java

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User Interface of EVE Prototype
http//ouranos.ceid.upatras.gr/vr/
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Functionality (1/2)

• Multiple communication channels
• voice chat
• text chat
• non verbal communication through gestures
• User's representation and awareness through
  avatars
• Manipulation of users
• Manipulation of shared objects

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Functionality (2/2)

• The presentation table tool with
• a 3D Whiteboard/slide presenter
• a brainstorming board
• a video presenter
• support of drag and drop learning material
• Application Sharing
• Break-out session rooms for supporting sub-groups
  of users in the same e-learning session

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The end

• Thank you for your attention!
• tsiatsos_at_cti.gr