Ishbel Duncan

A taxonomy of virtual worlds usage in education

Abstract Virtual worlds are an important tool in modern education practices as well as providing socialisation, entertainment and a laboratory for collaborative work. This paper focuses on the uses of virtual worlds for education and synthesises over 100 published academic papers, reports and educational websites from around the world. A taxonomy is then derived from these papers, delineating current theoretical and practical work on virtual world usage, specifically in the field of education. The taxonomy identifies rich veins of current research and practice in associated educational theory and in simulated worlds or environments, yet it also demonstrates the paucity of work in important areas such as evaluation, grading and accessibility. Practitioner notes What is already known about this topic • The use of virtual worlds for supporting education is widespread and increasing. • There are numerous studies on virtual worlds usage in education. • Virtual worlds are mainly used for collaborative- or simulation-based education. What this paper adds • An analysis and synthesis of over 100 academic papers and virtual worlds, multi-user virtual environments and virtual learning environments. • A taxonomic differentiation based upon population, educational activity and learning theory. • A balance sheet of the disadvantages and advantages of using virtual worlds in education. • Identification of under developed areas of research into virtual worlds in education. Implications for practice and/or policy • Motivates the use of virtual worlds to support experiential learning, where real world experiential learning is difficult to achieve due to barriers of time, cost and place. • Identification of difficulties and challenges in the educational use of virtual worlds. These may be overcome through future work or help identify where the use of virtual worlds is not appropriate. • Identification of where the current development or research focus is: pedagogy, collaboration, enquiry-based learning and identity, etc.

Emergent requirements for supporting introductory programming

Abstract The problems associated with learning and teaching first year University Computer Science (CS1) programming classes are summarized showing that various support tools and techniques have been developed and evaluated. From this review of applicable support the paper derives ten requirements that a support tool should have in order to improve CS1 student success rate with respect to learning and understanding.

Polsterless Remote Electronic Voting

Abstract Remote electronic voting is currently being piloted in the UK as a means of increasing the convenience of casting a ballot, which it is hoped will be reflected in an increased participation in elections. Most proposed electronic voting schemes envisage the use of cryptography in order to model the features of democratic elections, which, informally, include notions such as the secret ballot and a verifiable tallying system. This approach requires the use of a software artifact, or polster, which casts a ballot on the electors behalf. A consequence of this approach requires the elector to trust software supplied by the election authority, as well as limiting the range of devices on which the ballot may be cast. An alternative to the use of cryptography employs a polsterless electronic voting system. Here, a proposed polsterless system for UK elections is considered and the flaws identified. A revised scheme is then proposed that provides verifiability and improved resistance to abuse, without requiring too much additional participation from the elector.

Energy Preservation in Environmental Monitoring WSN

This paper addresses support for energy efficient single-hop communications in Environmental Monitoring Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN). The main contributions are twofold firstly; the identification of scenarios where single hop communication, between multiple sensors and a base station is both feasible and offers benefits with respect to power preservation. Secondly, the design implementation and evaluation of the Power and Reliability Aware Protocol (PoRAP) which can minimize energy consumption whilst preserving reliability is presented. PoRAP is a measurement based adaptive protocol that provides probabilistic reliability. It uses measurements of Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI) to identify when the transmission power can be decreased without reducing the Packet Reception Rate (PRR). Consequently, reduced power can often be used for transmission. In PoRAP source transmission is scheduled and radios only start for the reception of control packets and data transmissions. The scheduling reduces the likely hood of collisions and minimizes idle listening. The required duty cycle is reduced further by tracking clock drift between sensors and base stations. In these ways PoRAP reduces the power required for single hop communication between a sensor and its base station.

E-Voting in an Ubicomp World

The advances made in technology have unchained the user from the desktop into interactions where access is anywhere, anytime. In addition, the introduction of ubiquitous computing (ubicomp) will see further changes in how we interact with technology and also socially. Ubicomp evokes a near future in which humans will be surrounded by “always-on,” unobtrusive, interconnected intelligent objects where information is exchanged seamlessly. This seamless exchange of information has vast social implications, in particular the protection and management of personal information. This research project investigates the concepts of trust and privacy issues specifically related to the exchange of e-voting information when using a ubicomp type system.

Biology Students Building Computer Simulations Using StarLogo TNG

Abstract Confidence is an important issue for biology students in handling computational concepts. This paper describes a practical in which honours-level bioscience students simulate complex animal behaviour using StarLogo TNG, a freely-available graphical programming environment. The practical consists of two sessions, the first of which guides students through building their own computer simulation using StarLogo TNG’s graphical programming blocks. The second practical requires them to modify the simulation and carry out a simulation-based experiment. Results from pre- and post-surveys show that, after completing the practical, students have increased their confidence in answering questions requiring understanding of computer code.

Thinking Towards a Pattern Language for Predicate Based Encryption Crypto-Systems

Predicate Based Encryption (PBE) is a novel family of public key encryption schemes that allows for expressive, and fine-grained, access control to be integrated within the cryptographic process. Providing an efficient means to realise distributed encrypted access control. Security patterns allow for security problems and their solutions to be described concretely and precisely, and be applied directly within the software development process. Pattern languages provide a means to specify how a set of interconnected patterns can be used together to solve a set of related problems. This paper proposes the construction of a pattern language governing the design and deployment of PBE crypto-systems. An overview for the proposed language is given together with a discussion towards issues affecting its specification.

Two variations to the mCESG pollsterless e-voting scheme

Over the past several years, the UK government has piloted several new voting technologies during local authority elections. The mCESG pollsterless Remote Electronic Voting (REV) system, which was designed with the UK electoral context in mind, is described in detail by Storer and Duncan (2004). Here, we describe two variations to the mCESG scheme which (a) improve its suitability for the variety of electoral systems in use in the UK and (b) provide a means for resisting coercion attacks to which the original scheme was vulnerable.

Security Pattern Evaluation

Current Security Pattern evaluation techniques are demonstrated to be incomplete with respect to quantitative measurement and comparison. A proposal for a dynamic testbed system is presented as a potential mechanism for evaluating patterns within a constrained environment.

Intelligent Biological Security Testing Agents

This fast abstract outlines a novel mechanism for monitoring the security state of a system, using intelligent testing agents to instigate and then depress security activities.