Tell Me and I Forget, Involve Me and I Learn: Design and Evaluation of a Multimodal Conversational Agent for Supporting Distance Learning

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has shifted children's learning routines from schools to their own homes, necessitating learning support solutions. This paper reports on a design science research project that combines augmented reality with a conversational agent to assist schoolchildren in learning complex subjects by providing verbal descriptions and interactive animations. Drawing on the theoretical foundations of multimedia learning, we derive three design principles to resolve seven issues associated with distance learning. The instantiated artifact augments text-based learning resources and facilitates learning in a context-sensitive manner through multimodal output. The proof-of-concept evaluation with 11 experienced teachers and researchers in the field of didactics confirms the usefulness of these design principles and suggests refinements of the artifact. © 2022 17th International Conference on Wirtschaftsinformatik, WI 2022. All rights reserved.