Fran Hagstrom

Modeling Healthcare Logistics in a Virtual World

One of the main themes of these columns has been pervasive computing - exploring a collection of technologies that could work together to make it easier to usher in the Internet of things. In this paper, we review enabling technologies, then take a look at how we can use virtual worlds (in particular, Second Life) to accelerate pervasive computings development.

Formative Learning and Assessment

In this article, the author clarifies formative learning and assessment for persons who are seeking additional ideas for courses, degree programs, or personal career goals. This scholarly review uses published literature to clarify differences between formative and summative assessment and to outline developmental issues that guide constructivist learning principles. The author provides illustrative teaching examples to demonstrate how to integrate formative learning and assessment into classroom and clinic educational practices. She concludes by advocating formative learning and assessment as a societally necessary educational step for the preparation of career-minded professionals.

Talk and task mastery: The importance of socially shared talk during computer‐based problem solving

In order to examine more closely the ways that children use socially constructed dialogue to mediate task mastery a hierarchical set of computer tasks were presented in an animated game format (ToonTalk) to three adult/child (US Kindergarten) dyads over five sessions. Transcriptions of the adult‐child talk were used to determine (1) the types of discourses utilized by the children (i.e., procedural, conversation, narrative) during problem solving and (2) the relationship of this talk to task mastery. It was found that (1) shared talk was associated with more successful problem solving; (2) socially shared talk did not have to be on task to be beneficial; and (3) procedural discourse was more successfully and frequently used for independent problem solving if first requested by the child. These results highlight the importance of socially shared talk in the development of problem solving strategies even when using computer technology.