Sunday, March 11, 2012

"Building, the map" and haptic-integrated pronunciation

Have recently had some fascinating interaction with a grad student who was having a great deal of difficulty following the pedagogical movement patterns on the haptic videos. The task of the learner is to mirror the video, speaking and moving along with the model. The problem for her was one that we have come to expect occasionally (perhaps of one in twenty or so), especially in instructors in training. The linked research by Carson et al. (2010) investigates parameters of buildings where people are less likely to get lost: " . . . an integrative framework that encompasses these factors and their intersections:

Clipart: Clker
  • the correspondence between the building and the cognitive map, 
  • the completeness of the cognitive map as a function of the strategies and individual abilities of the users, 
  • the compatibility between the building and the strategies and individual abilities of the users, and 
  • the complexity that emerges from the intersection of all three factors."

Seen from that perspective, where the map must be a function of/emerge from the strategies and abilities of users, the answer has begun to emerge as well: extensive, sufficient haptic and visual anchoring for all learners. Getting some to mirror pedagogical movement consistently can be virtually impossible without an analogous, relatively complete visual and somatic map of the sound system, accessible to even the most a-haptic among them, much more so than I had anticipated early on in the work. Fortunately, we can do that now. As so often happens, the "problem" has become the solution.



1 comment:

  1. There are times when the space of a post just does not do the topic justice. This is one. The concept that the learner with the most "serious" challenges for the system should provide us with the essential set of parameters or criteria for design is worth a great deal of discussion. I will come back to this theme repeatedly as the haptic video system "goes public" in the coming months. The same principle applies in many contexts.

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