Virtual Tutor Inside A Game: A Case Study From The Mirror Project

The emergence of new technologies as a learning tool has significantly induced changes in teaching and offers a chance to constructivism theories (i.e. reflective learning) to be tested while placing the learners as active actors at the centre of their own knowledge building. In the main class of 'new technologies', specifically, serious games create real 'new learning experiences' in a safe virtual environment in which learners can have an active role, experiment new situations and learn from their errors. These are no longer perceived with frustration but as opportunities for personal enhancement. Seen from the Reflective learning angle, serious games have the potential to increase the ability of learners to reflect on and learn from their past experiences for at least three reasons: Even if a serious game represents a virtual experience, it is still a direct experience that engages people both psychologically and physiologically. Nevertheless, such virtual experience provides some distance from reality, and facilitates reflection-in-action and reflection-on-action. Serious games allow "Repeatability". They offer a simulated environment or a realistically re-created role play scenario that enables learners to try out a particular strategy or adopt a certain approach or behavior. If they fail or do not quite deliver the desired outcome, then they can try again with a modified approach. Serious games allow self-evaluation. Frequent, direct clear 'feedbacks' that most serious games provide, contribute to feed the learner's reflection on their direct/virtual, past/present experiences. This paper describes a game application designed for care homes and hospitals in the frame of the MIRROR project. The game aims to empower and engage employees to reflect on past work performances and personal learning experiences in order to learn in "real-time" and to creatively solve pressing problems. It depicts the 3D virtual hospital or care home environment developed with UNITY, where the user, playing a nurse/carer's role, is challenged with some patients/residents' 'complex dialogue'. It introduces and portrays the central figure of a Virtual Tutor and details the gaming functions designed to provide the user with: Additional relevant information on demand; Frequent, rapid and clear feedback completed by deep final reports showing a clear link between acts and consequences; Specific help when repetitive errors or patterns are detected by the game system. Adequate tools to take a step back and collect one's own thoughts. The paper describes how the various gaming characteristics and supports offered by the Virtual Tutor create favorable conditions so as to allow learners to adopt a reflective attitude towards their own past/present acts and experiences, learning to take place and eventually to maximize the Zone of Proximal Development of the learner. Preliminary results of user experiences are reported and an outlook on further steps is given.