Sensemaking Support Research Articles

Representational-competency supports in the context of an educational video game for undergraduate astronomy

Educational video games can engage students in authentic STEM practices, which often involve visual representations. Specifically, because most interactions within video games are mediated through visual representations, video games provide opportunities for students to experience disciplinary practices with visuals. Research demonstrates, however, that learning from multiple visuals is complex. Prior research in structured environments has demonstrated that providing supports for representational competencies in terms of sense-making competencies and perceptual fluency can support learners, but such research has not been conducted in game environments. To address this gap, we investigated whether supports for representational competencies enhanced students' learning with an astronomy video game. We conducted an experiment with 115 students to investigate the effects of sense-making support (yes vs. no) and perceptual-fluency support (yes vs. no) within an astronomy game. Results showed that sense-making supports did not enhance students' content learning. Further, perceptual-fluency supports enhanced students' content learning outcomes only when they had high content pre-test scores. Hence, interventions that support representational competencies in non-game environments may work differently in the context of educational video games. This suggests that designers may need to develop new strategies to support students’ learning with disciplinary visuals in educational games.

Using ethnodrama to support parents in sense-making after prenatal or neonatal diagnosis of a child's disabling condition.

This study describes the process of developing video vignettes to meet the parent-expressed need for balanced, meaningful messages about what life may be like for parents who have a child with a disability. Each vignette teaches a general audience salient concepts derived from a grounded theory of the parental process of Rescuing Hope after a child's diagnosis with a developmental disability. Using ethnodrama methodology, we completed a secondary analysis of 21 interviews with parents who learned of their child's diagnosis of Down syndrome. Understanding the grounded theory of Rescuing Hope has the potential to help parents construct meaning and purpose as they adapt to parenting a child with a disability. The short dramatic vignettes may be placed across platforms, settings and partnerships, with relevance for teachers, clinicians, family members, caregivers. Designed for wide distribution, video vignettes may reach the people who most need sense-making support.

Adaptive support for representational competencies during technology-based problem solving in chemistry

ABSTRACT Background: A key aspect of STEM learning is the use of visual representations for problem solving. To successfully use visuals, students need to make sense of how they show concepts and to fluently perceive domain-relevan information in them. Adding support for sense making and perceptual fluency to problem-solving activities enhances students’ learning of content knowledge. However, students need different types of representational-competency supports, depending on their prior knowledge. This suggests that adaptively assigning students to sense-makingand perceptual-fluency support might be more effective than assigning all students to the same sequence of these supports. Method: We tested this hypothesis in an experiment with 44 undergraduate students in a chemistry course. Students were randomly assigned to a ten-week sequence of problem-solving activities that either provided a fixed sequence of sense-making support and perceptual-fluency support or adaptively assigned these supports based on students’ problem-solving interactions. Findings: Results show that adaptive representational-competency supports reduced students’ confusion and mistakes during problem solving while increasing their learning of content knowledge. Contribution: Our study is the first to show that adaptive support for representational competencies can significantly enhance learning of content knowledge. Given the pervasiveness of visuals, our results may inform general STEM instruction.

Sensemaking support system (S3) for manufacturing process improvement

Production management teams often face unfamiliar situations where each team member must understand new phenomena individually before the team can make mutually understandable and acceptable decisions. Contradicting subjective judgments can distort the group’s decision-making process because team members understand situations differently and are generally prone to behavioural biases. This paper presents the development of a sensemaking support system (S3,S cube) for selecting improvement projects in a complex,small-volume batch production system of a premium car manufacturer. All phases of the sensemaking process are facilitated by making various sources of information available to a team of managers and experts to reduce conflicts regarding the selection of improvement projects. S3 is based on a lens model which combines judgments of the management team with discrete event simulation and provides visual representations of the differences and misjudgements related to various improvement options. The results – that can easily be generalised to many similar settings – indicate different understanding and lack of coherence within the management team which prevents them from defining mutually acceptable actions. This is countered with the creation of an action proposal,summarising and visualising causal relationships,and connecting them to improvement options to improve performance of the production system.

Mixing languages for science learning and participation: an examination of Korean-English bilingual learners in an after-school science-learning programme

ABSTRACTBilingual and multilingual speakers mix two or more languages for communication, gaining information and sense-making in varieties of contexts. How do bilinguals mix languages and what does the mixing afford for their learning and participation? This study examines these questions, focusing on Korean-English bilingual youths in a community-based after-school science programme in the United States. A close analysis of videorecordings of the programme sessions demonstrates the ways in which bilinguals negotiate their participant positions and negotiate meanings in their study of science topics. The findings reveal that bilinguals utilise their Korean proficiency to craft diverse ways of participation and that linguistic and scientific sense-making co-occur and support each other. Based on these findings, I offer implications as to how science teachers should perceive students’ mixing of multiple languages and how they can support bilinguals’ learning of science content and English. Additionally, I suggest a future research direction that can help teachers to prepare for linguistically diverse science-learning and -teaching contexts.

Leveraging the potential of peer feedback in an academic writing activity through sense-making support

The act of revising is an important aspect of academic writing. Although revision is crucial for eliminating writing errors and producing high-quality texts, research on writing expertise shows that novices rarely engage in revision activities. Providing information on writing errors by means of peer feedback has become a popular method in writing instruction. However, despite its popularity, students have difficulties in leveraging the potential of peer feedback: feedback uptake is low and students engage in little revision. Instructional support might help learners to make sense of peer feedback and to reflect on the provided information more deeply. The present study investigated the effect of sense-making support on feedback uptake as well as on revision skills, in particular problem detection and problem correction. In an experimental study, 73 university students were randomly assigned to conditions with or without sense-making support. The results indicate that feedback uptake improved concerning two out of three variables: students in the condition with sense-making support made fewer new errors and rejected more incorrect feedback comments. Students’ revision skills only improved with regard to problem detection. Overall, we were able to show that peer feedback alone might not be sufficient to make successful changes in the text and improve revision skills. Sense-making support proved to be effective to some extent and partially helped to maximize the benefits of peer feedback.

Supporting students in making sense of connections and in becoming perceptually fluent in making connections among multiple graphical representations.

Prior research shows that multiple representations can enhance learning, provided that students make connections among them. We hypothesized that support for connection making is most effective in enhancing learning of domain knowledge if it helps students both in making sense of these connections and in becoming perceptually fluent in making connections. We tested this hypothesis in an experiment with 428 4th- and 5th-grade students who worked with different versions of an intelligent tutoring system for fractions learning. Results did not show main effects for sense-making or fluency-building support but an interaction effect, such that a combination of sense-making and fluency-building support is most effective in enhancing fractions knowledge. Causal path analysis of log data from the system shows that sense-making support enhances students’ benefit from fluency-building support, but fluency-building support does not enhance their benefit from sense-making support. Our results suggest that both understanding of connections and perceptual fluency in connection making are critical aspects of learning of domain knowledge with multiple graphical representations. Findings from the causal path analysis lead to the testable prediction that instruction should provide sense-making support and fluency-building support for connection making.

Using a contextualized sensemaking model for interaction design: A case study of tumor contouring

Sensemaking theories help designers understand the cognitive processes of a user when he/she performs a complicated task. This paper introduces a two-step approach of incorporating sensemaking support within the design of health information systems by: (1) modeling the sensemaking process of physicians while performing a task, and (2) identifying software interaction design requirements that support sensemaking based on this model. The two-step approach is presented based on a case study of the tumor contouring clinical task for radiotherapy planning. In the first step of the approach, a contextualized sensemaking model was developed to describe the sensemaking process based on the goal, the workflow and the context of the task. In the second step, based on a research software prototype, an experiment was conducted where three contouring tasks were performed by eight physicians respectively. Four types of navigation interactions and five types of interaction sequence patterns were identified by analyzing the gathered interaction log data from those twenty-four cases. Further in-depth study on each of the navigation interactions and interaction sequence patterns in relation to the contextualized sensemaking model revealed five main areas for design improvements to increase sensemaking support. Outcomes of the case study indicate that the proposed two-step approach was beneficial for gaining a deeper understanding of the sensemaking process during the task, as well as for identifying design requirements for better sensemaking support.

A Bayesian Abduction Model for Extracting Most Probable Evidence to Support Sense Making

In this paper, we discuss the development of a Bayesian Abduction Model of Sensemaking Support (BAMSS) as a tool for information fusion to support prospective sensemaking. Currently, BAMSS can identify the Most Probable Explanation from a Bayesian Belief Network (BBN) and extract the prevalent conditional probability values to help the sensemaking analysts to understand the cause-effect of the adversary information. Actual vignettes from databases of modern insurgencies and asymmetry warfare are used to validate the performance of BAMSS. BAMSS computes the posterior probability of the network edges and performs information fusion using a clustering algorithm. In the model, the friendly force commander uses the adversary information to prospectively make sense of the enemy’s intent. Sensitivity analyses were used to confirm the robustness of BAMSS in generating the Most Probable Explanations from a BBN through abductive inference. The simulation results demonstrate the utility of BAMSS as a computational tool to support sense making.

Enhancing undergraduate chemistry learning by helping students make connections among multiple graphical representations

Multiple representations are ubiquitous in chemistry education. To benefit from multiple representations, students have to make connections between them. However, connection making is a difficult task for students. Prior research shows that supporting connection making enhances students' learning in math and science domains. Most prior research has focused on supporting one type of connection-making process: conceptually making sense of connections among representations. Yet, recent research suggests that a second type of connection-making process plays a role in students' learning: perceptual fluency in translating among representations. I hypothesized that combining support for both conceptual sense making of connections and for perceptual fluency in connection making leads to higher learning gains in general chemistry among undergraduate students. I tested this hypothesis in two experiments with altogetherN= 158 undergraduate students using an intelligent tutoring system for chemistry atomic structure and bonding. Results suggest that the combination of conceptual sense-making support and perceptual fluency-building support for connection making is effective for students with low prior knowledge, whereas students with high prior knowledge benefit most from receiving perceptual fluency-building support alone. This finding suggests that students' learning in chemistry can be enhanced if instruction provides support for connection making among multiple representations in a way that tailors to their specific learning needs.

Collaborative Sensemaking Support

Sensemaking involves incomplete discovery, inaccurate interpretation, and imperfect action that will fail in someway and likely alter the situation in some unknowable way. Sensemaking demands intense, deep collaboration with participating agents, who many times are physically distributed and come from different groups and organizations. Incorporating collaboration functionality in a piecemeal approach in different ways as add-ons within a portal-based architecture can place heavy demands on users to learn, organizations to train, and ultimately limit the potential of collaboration technology to achieve organizational goals. It is proposed that individual and group sensemaking is a better starting point from which to build architectures to mitigate socio-cognitive limitations of participating agents collaborating to make sense of things. Three levels of Collaboration Envelopes™ are presented and architectural considerations presented to guide development of technology to better support collaborative sensemaking.