Supporting computer science student reading through multimodal engagement interfaces

While many computer science (CS) curricula are increasingly addressing a demand for more communicative and ethical graduates, reports of CS student difficulties with nontechnical subjects, such as Professional Ethics, persist. These seem compounded for students learning through a second or foreign l...

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Main Authors: Pike, Matthew, Shen, Kejia, Towey, Dave
Format: Conference or Workshop Item
Language:English
Published: 2020
Subjects:
Online Access:https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/64079/
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author Pike, Matthew
Shen, Kejia
Towey, Dave
author_facet Pike, Matthew
Shen, Kejia
Towey, Dave
author_sort Pike, Matthew
building Nottingham Research Data Repository
collection Online Access
description While many computer science (CS) curricula are increasingly addressing a demand for more communicative and ethical graduates, reports of CS student difficulties with nontechnical subjects, such as Professional Ethics, persist. These seem compounded for students learning through a second or foreign language. This paper explores the impact that multimodal engagement interfaces can have on content comprehension. 30 participants of varying English language ability were asked to engage with four unrelated articles under four different conditions: baseline reading (C1); guided reading (sentence-by-sentence) (C2); audio/listening only (C3); and concurrent (multi-modal) presentation of C2 & C3 (C4). After each engagement, participants were asked to complete a comprehension test on the material that they had just encountered. A subjective survey evaluating the “comfort” and “engagement quality” of each interface was also completed after each interaction. Our results paint a complex picture with the guided reading interface (C2) producing both the best performance, and the poorest subjective evaluation from participants. This result aligns with existing findings identified in the field of reading education. The results highlight how varying language levels in participants impact subjective and performance metrics, suggesting how future interfaces may better support readers, according to their language ability or intended outcomes of reading.
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spelling nottingham-640792020-12-21T05:48:57Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/64079/ Supporting computer science student reading through multimodal engagement interfaces Pike, Matthew Shen, Kejia Towey, Dave While many computer science (CS) curricula are increasingly addressing a demand for more communicative and ethical graduates, reports of CS student difficulties with nontechnical subjects, such as Professional Ethics, persist. These seem compounded for students learning through a second or foreign language. This paper explores the impact that multimodal engagement interfaces can have on content comprehension. 30 participants of varying English language ability were asked to engage with four unrelated articles under four different conditions: baseline reading (C1); guided reading (sentence-by-sentence) (C2); audio/listening only (C3); and concurrent (multi-modal) presentation of C2 & C3 (C4). After each engagement, participants were asked to complete a comprehension test on the material that they had just encountered. A subjective survey evaluating the “comfort” and “engagement quality” of each interface was also completed after each interaction. Our results paint a complex picture with the guided reading interface (C2) producing both the best performance, and the poorest subjective evaluation from participants. This result aligns with existing findings identified in the field of reading education. The results highlight how varying language levels in participants impact subjective and performance metrics, suggesting how future interfaces may better support readers, according to their language ability or intended outcomes of reading. 2020-10-15 Conference or Workshop Item PeerReviewed application/pdf en cc_by https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/64079/1/Supporting%20Computer%20Science%20Student%20Reading%20through%20Multimodal%20Engagement%20Interfaces.pdf Pike, Matthew, Shen, Kejia and Towey, Dave (2020) Supporting computer science student reading through multimodal engagement interfaces. In: 2019 IEEE International Conference on Engineering, Technology and Education (TALE), 10-13 Dec. 2019, Yogyakarta, Indonesia, Indonesia. article comprehension; multi-modal interfaces; Simultaneous listening and reading; listening comprehension; L2 readers http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/TALE48000.2019.9225970 10.1109/TALE48000.2019.9225970 10.1109/TALE48000.2019.9225970 10.1109/TALE48000.2019.9225970
spellingShingle article comprehension; multi-modal interfaces; Simultaneous listening and reading; listening comprehension; L2 readers
Pike, Matthew
Shen, Kejia
Towey, Dave
Supporting computer science student reading through multimodal engagement interfaces
title Supporting computer science student reading through multimodal engagement interfaces
title_full Supporting computer science student reading through multimodal engagement interfaces
title_fullStr Supporting computer science student reading through multimodal engagement interfaces
title_full_unstemmed Supporting computer science student reading through multimodal engagement interfaces
title_short Supporting computer science student reading through multimodal engagement interfaces
title_sort supporting computer science student reading through multimodal engagement interfaces
topic article comprehension; multi-modal interfaces; Simultaneous listening and reading; listening comprehension; L2 readers
url https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/64079/
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/64079/
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/64079/