Covase: Collaborative Visualization for Constructivist Learning

Abstract

The paper specifies CoVASE, a software for teachers to create and view networked learning environments (VE). Students carry out virtual experiments in CoVASE, at the same time and from different places. They use the same tools and work on the same scientific problems as researchers do. Teachers create a motivating, demanding, and authentic interaction between learners and real-world problems, a premise for constructivist learning (CL). CoVASE generates and displays the result of a numerical simulation in parallel of its progress on distributed 3D graphic viewers, steered by users in real-time. VEs mediate communication between users, deictic elements, and display. Researchers and students have evaluated the predecessors of CoVASE with good results. A field study is planned for 2003.