FICTION AND EXPERIENCE Experimentation of a multimodal interface

Author(s):

Nazario Zambaldi(presenting / submitting)

Conference:

ECER 2017

Network:

06. Open Learning: Media, Environments and Cultures

Format:

Paper

Session Information

06 SES 06, Exploring Students' Perspectives in Digital Environments

Paper Session

Time:

2017-08-23

15:30-17:00

Room:

K6.15

Chair:

Geir Haugsbakk

Contribution

The title of the study "Embodied education through art and theatre" indicates the perspective that this study therefore assumes. In particular, Embodied Education includes the contributions of Embodied Cognition, that is, that area of psychological research that represents a "new paradigm" for psychology, shifting from the abstractness of classic cognitive psychology to physicality. "Art" and "Theatre", visual and kinesic channels, are the aspects of physicality that Embodied Cognition (Rizzolati 1988, 1996; Fadiga, Craighero 2003) addresses, based on the discovery of the so-called MNS, Mirror Neuron System (Gallese, Rizzolatti 1996).
The subtitle of the thesis, "Experimentation of a multimodal interface" indicates a construct, or "didactic mediator" (Damiano 1989), created in order to integrate the three levels identified by Bruner, focusing in particular on the iconic-representative and enactive stages rather than symbolic. The intent is to highlight how and if Embodiment functions in this set.
The hypothesis - or "question" of the research expressed in the title aims to identify "Embodied Education" (a rare term and one that is often confused with Embodied Cognition) through the didactic experience, in a pedagogical direction that corresponds in particular to the research on Montessori and Embodied Education (Rathunde 2009) or even more pertinently on Embodied Education as a convergence between phenomenological pedagogy and Embodiment (Francesconi, Tarozzi 2012).
This objective - a foundational contribution between Embodied Cognition in psychology and Embodiment in phenomenology (and phenomenological pedagogy) - is pursued also on a philosophical, epistemological, visual and physical level, in the conviction that "Embodiment" and "Embodied Education" imply a mode of thinking as much as a mode of being physical, bodily. With this aim, I introduce the philosophy of "als ob" (Wahinger, 1910), in which the approach to the world as a "fiction" creates a "fictional" theoretical backdrop to the experimentation.
The conclusions arrive at a point but are to be continued:
- in the tests with the EMI interface, as an experiential didactic mediator, it displayed an embodied set (visual and physical contact, mapping of thoughts and environment),
- in experimental aesthetics in which in the artistic and bodily dimensions integrate a discursive phenomenological approach in visual, incorporated thinking,
- in the connection of Embodied Education as a pedagogy of embodiment (Verkörperung) between empirical and theoretical dimensions, cognitive and phenomenological neuroscience in dialogue (Brinkmann 2015),
- in post-humanism in relation to a critical pedagogy (Schütz 2016) oriented to the meaning that comes from learning,
in a logic of paradox that resolves the contradictions (within-without, subject-object, before-after), on a logical or conscious level, vital structure of meaning, planes of reality, framing, from Bateson to Deleuze.
In collaboration with the Humboldt University Berlin (Institute of Education Sciences, Department of General Education), Akt-Zent Intenational Theater Center Berlin, Municipal and Regional Theater of Patras, University of Patras (Department of Educational Science and Early Childhood Education).

Method

The methodological part of the thesis, the tools and methods, opens with an introductory chapter, between experience and experimentation, where the design of the research is explained. Starting from phenomenology, it applies the three moments of reduction-description-variation in the reconstruction of a pedagogical experience pädagogische Erfahrung (Brinkmann 2015), first addressing variation as an abductive dimension of thought (Peirce 2003), the "thought of discovery". From this varied perspective the empirical, experimental dimension and the pedagogical, educational and didactic practices are introduced. In terms of experience, experiential learning (Kolb 1984) with Dewey and Lewin, create the backdrop, together with a reference to didactic mediation (Damiano 1994) and to didactics through concepts (Calvani 2010, 2014). On the experimental level the most obvious reference is that which introduces neurophenomenology (Lutz 2002), linking narration in first and third person. That is, the responses of subjects after phenomenological training and behavioural responses ("photographed" reactions in the brain). The analysis of the results took the quantitative questionnaire into consideration on a descriptive level and focused on the factors related to Embodied Education - self-consciousness, self-awareness, agency, empathy, bodily awareness, spatial awareness - and on the statistical significance, although within the limited sample size. A qualitative analysis of the interviews during activities and the retrospective interview dialogues was done according to the Mayring method, using inductive categorization on the text fragments according to the focus factors - self-awareness, self-consciousness, self-efficacy and spatial, emotional, relational, social and bodily agency - also evaluating the quantitative incidence. The sociometric analysis revealed the links between acceptance and refusal, creating sociograms of the groups for the entire sample relative to the affective relational, organisational (leadership), and operative (task) levels, pre and post-test. We describe the training, which could also be called phenomenological, but which we prefer to connect to aesthetic experimentation and Embodied Education. It begins from the pilot study, with the aim of selecting visual and kinetic elements as embodiment in a theatrical artistic experience: E.C.O. Electronic Cooperation Online. We describe the experimentation itself, integrating both the ECO activities and the tools used for the pilot study observations. In particular, the experimental EMI construct, Experiential Multimodal Interface, inherits the set and mapping of ECO to represent thoughts, imaginings and actions. The dialogue conducted online is a base for a narrative and theatrical embodiment, integrating it with a part of the theatrical training (Alschitz).

Expected Outcomes

The discussion of the results, beyond the first-person experience, also considered the participant observation, the documentation of the videos of the meeting, the interviews to evaluate metacognition, to support the inferences and evaluations. In the discussion we reveal how the quantitative analysis has little statistical significance. The only significant variation was related to two scales connected to bodily and social awareness. Comparing the classes on other scales, the experimental group showed a reduction in the values after the EMI test. This data, which indicates a reduced perception in social efficacy, management of emotions, and self-awareness, could instead mean an initial personal processing of these transformative aspects. This was the direction the qualitative analysis of the contents moved in, where in addition to forty motivational aspects, we also recorded changes related to the EMI experience for four moments (t1, t2, t3, t4) and observations that revealed the effectiveness of the tools for reflective and metacognitive elements, and above all, for social and relational elements, and those related to the recognition and management of emotions. The sociometric analysis, which only revealed changes in the group maps for the experimental group, showed an increase in the interaction with the extended environment of the class. In particular, it showed a reduction in the conflictual reciprocity "of rejection" with evidence in particular regarding gender, which was initially the criteria to create the subgroups, most noticeable on an affective relational level (after the experience the groups were opened to mixed connections). After a discussion, using schemas, constructs and models, which were the tools used in the representative "games" of the experience, we pass to the videographic phenomenological analysis (Brinkmann 2015). In particular, we look at Pedagogische Erfahrung, the pedagogical experience, observed in the video images.

References

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Author Information

Nazario Zambaldi (presenting / submitting)

Free University of Bolzano

Merano

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