Elementary school students use technology to become tree detectives at Penn State Arboretum
The College of Education teamed with the Penn State Arboretum during Arbor Day last April to help fourth grade students from three local schools, Park Forest Elementary School, Grays Woods Elementary School, and Radio Park Elementary School, explore tree and plant science. Using iPads and iPods, the students became “Tree Investigators,” exploring and learning about trees at the Arboretum.
Tree Detective poster with tree identification information
The Tree Investigators project is the brainchild of the Augmented Learning Research Group, a research group comprised of faculty and graduate students with a focus on learning, design, and technology. The group was started by Heather Zimmerman, assistant professor of education, and Susan Land, associate professor of education. “The goal of our research group is to apply learning sciences and constructivist learning theories to the development of apps for mobile learning devices like iPods, iPads, smart phones, and tablets,” Zimmerman said.
Land added there are two purposes to the group’s work. “We are developing more robust learning theories that reflect the way that youth learn with technologies in settings such as school, home, and extra-curricular activities,” she said. “And we want to develop more innovative, mobile technologies that extend educational computing beyond school desktops and out into the homes, lives, and experiences of youth.”
They put these theories into practice at the Arboretum via the Tree Investigators project, staffing a station at the event. The local fourth-graders used iPods and iPads to explore the trees using augmented reality. “The mobile computing educational strategy we used was based on ‘augmented reality,’ which uses mobile devices to augment or extend a real physical space with new content from another space, such as scenarios, animations, media, or textual information,” Zimmerman said. “This augmentation provides learners additional resources to engage with in their physical space.”
In this project, the Tree Investigators used Microsoft Tag Reader to bring specific Web-based content to an iPod or iPad via a QR barcode tag near the tree. The students snapped a picture of one of these tags, and this gave them additional information including photographs and text on a website Zimmerman and Land created.
The students “solved” the mystery and learned about trees using the technology in four main ways. First, the “tree mystery” scenario was a context for applying their observations about trees. Second, Land and Zimmerman augmented students’ physical observations of trees with text and images accessed via the QR codes that were indexed to specific trees to highlight variations in physical characteristics. Third, they used a Google SketchUp plug-in and large-sized tag markers to show clues about the mystery tree that could be rotated and viewed through a stationary webcam and monitor. Finally, they used an existing tree-identification app (US Trees) that students used on iPods and iPads to narrow down the mystery tree species, based on its characteristics that were modeled on the monitor.
Land said that the iPods and iPads were perfect for these types of learning activities. “These devices provided us with the portability that we needed for the outdoor environment, and the built-in cameras allowed us to create and display content and images easily through use of the QR Tag reader system,” she said.
Students use an iPhone to read a QR code and get Tree Detective clues
Zimmerman and Land both agreed that using them was effective in this initial use, but they want to see more data and will continue to develop the program. “Tree Investigators is still in development, so we have not conducted formal educational research on its use yet,” Zimmerman said. “However, we will be testing it again more thoroughly in the early fall semester.”
Mobile devices have a lot of potential for education, Land said, because they offer so many different opportunities for learning. “This is a ripe area for educators to explore, and the field is quite open in terms of potential avenues for learning and research,” she said. “We are less focused on the iPad devices, per se, than we are on the kinds of learning opportunities afforded by its attributes.”
“We want to explore what those attributes mean in terms of the potential to connect learners with authentic everyday experiences, augment knowledge-rich settings anywhere, share and learn from others, and enhance performance at the point-of-demand. There are so many existing apps available for educators that are worth exploring more systematically through research.”
Zimmerman and Land are planning to expand the Tree Detectives to other local nature areas. “We have a project in the works to expand to other nature centers, like Shaver’s Creek. Future endeavors will likely be broader than outdoor education and science learning, including the use of iPads in school and university classrooms,” she said. “Doctoral students Lucy McLain and Michael Mohney will be helping to lead these upcoming projects.”
Education Technology Services contributed to the original project at the Arboretum by providing ten iPod Touches, five iPad 2’s, and a MIFI to help the College of Education test pilot the app at the Arbor Day event. “They also provided us with technical assistance to manage and sync the content for all of the various devices,” Zimmerman added.
