Characterizing navigation in interactive learning environments

Abstract

Interactive learning environments (ILEs) are increasingly used to support and enhance instruction and learning experiences. ILEs maintain and display information, allowing learners to interact with this information. One important method of interacting with information is navigation. Often, learners are required to navigate through the information space of an ILE, a process which can be quite difficult and cognitively exacting as the information space becomes very large and complex. Proper design can make this process less exacting and, at the same time, facilitate better learning of the information space. However, this is not easy to do, especially for ILEs. Frameworks can assist in the effective analysis and design of interactive environments. However, there is lack of conceptual frameworks for guiding the analysis and design of navigation in ILEs. This paper tries to address this issue by presenting a framework which can be used to characterize navigation within ILEs. To create this framework, this paper brings together research from various disciplines, such as human-computer interaction design, educational multimedia design, cognitive technologies and learning sciences. This framework prescribes a three-stage process for designing and analyzing navigation: 1. content structuring; 2. information navigation modeling; 3. interface presentation structuring. By bringing these three stages together, it is intended to provide a conceptual framework to assist and guide designers in the proper analysis and design of navigation in ILEs.

Keywords:

• navigation
• navigation design
• design frameworks
• human-computer interface design
• interactive learning environments

Acknowledgements

This research has been funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. The authors are very grateful to Parul Nanda for her comments on earlier drafts of this paper. The authors would also like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their valuable suggestions that helped to improve the quality of this paper.

Notes

1. Other aspects that designers may also need to consider are the different goals and conditions of learning, learners' abilities, skills and preferred thinking modes, and pedagogical issues related to physical environments in which ILEs can or should be used. Although these aspects may be important, they are beyond the scope of this paper and are, therefore, not addressed.

2. Hypermedia is sometimes referred to as hypertext. Both hypertext and hypermedia refer to similar ILEs; hypermedia differs from its predecessor, hypertext, in that it incorporates several media types such as video, sound, pictures, animations and text. Hypertext and hypermedia will be used interchangeably.