Use of simulated animations to enhance student learning

Transcription

1 Use of simulated animations to enhance student learning Report submitted for the e-learning TeNT Award Project Tim Brown Electronic Engineering University of Surrey April 2009

2 Executive Summary An expression used by a school science teacher The picture explains a thousand words certainly does hold for a number of cases. If someone is trying to explain directions or the workings of a device to someone, it isn t long before they find themselves needing to put pen to paper to draw what they are trying to explain. If one picture can explain a thousand words, does that mean that many pictures all put together can explain many thousands of words? This was one of the aims of this study, to see if use of animated images through students learning would enable them to more quickly realise fundamental concepts but not only that, to actually think deeper about those concepts, experiment with the animated resources and help themselves to problem solve, which in engineering is a very important aim to achieve. Results from this report indicate how in teaching about electromagnetics and how using animated images helps to visualise their concepts and further the students learning. Acknowledgements The support of the e-learning department for granting the funds to undertake this project is gratefully received. Furthermore the support of individuals in helping to undertake this project is gratefully received, in particular, the mentoring support from Dr Steve Rowett and the students who helped to provide feedback on the e-learning resources.

3 Contents Executive Summary... 2 Acknowledgements... 2 Contents... 3 List of Figures... 3 List of Tables... 3 Project Aims and Objectives... 4 Objectives of the project... 4 Methodology of Tasks... 6 Analysis of Usage... 7 Number of visits... 7 Average time spent on each tutorial... 7 Total time spent on each tutorial... 8 Total hours spent by each student... 9 Analysis of Student Learning Experience Survey information Student Discussion Summary of Findings Self Evaluation Conclusions and Recommendations Future Work Appendix I Results of the student feedback survey Appendix II Example of Animated Page on Ulearn Appendix III Example of animation using Microsoft Excel List of Figures Figure 1 - Example animation of a Yagi-Uda antenna used for television receivers... 4 Figure 2 - Chart showing the number of visits received on each tutorial page... 7 Figure 3 - Chart showing the average time spent on each tutorial... 8 Figure 4 - Chart showing the total time spent on each tutorial by all students together... 8 Figure 5 - Chart showing the proportion of total hours spent up to one week before an exam and finally one week before the exam... 9 Figure 6 Results of when students found themselves using the facility most Figure 7 - Results of how students used the ULearn facility Figure 8 Results of the usefulness of the propagation tutorials Figure 9 - Example of tutorial uploaded onto ULearn Figure 10 - Example of spreadsheet tutorial on ULearn List of Tables Table 1 - Summary of the time schedule... 5 Table 2 Results of when students found themselves using the facility most Table 3 Results of students who used the facility little Table 4 - Results of how students used the ULearn facility Table 5 - Results of usefulness of the antennas tutorials Table 6 - Results on the ease of nagivation... 18

4 Project Aims and Objectives For one of my modules, EEE0006, Antennas and Propagation, it teaches a subject area whereby many engineers will design antennas using simulation packages to animate the electromagnetic (EM) field behaviour of the antenna as well as evaluate its quality. The idea of this project was therefore to use such simulation packages such as Ansoft HFSS 1, which was already made available as a teaching resource to produce animated demonstrations of how antennas work and propagate EM fields through the environment. This was particularly of interest since EM fields are invisible and so this was a useful means to help visualise their operation to explain some fundamental aspects of EM propagation used in the course. The idea had already been developed for a level 2 undergraduate laboratory, where online resources had been made available to help students with the preparation 2. This was only a modest piece, however, so it was proposed that the idea be developed into supporting a whole taught module. An example of how HFSS can produce animated outputs is shown in Figure 1, where it is simulating the EM field patterns radiating from a simple antenna known as Yagi-Uda used for television receivers (usually placed on top of the roof of buildings pointing towards a television transmitter). This animation shows how the conducting elements of the antenna cause the EM fields to radiate (or be received) in the forward direction towards a television transmitter and not in the backward direction as it is not desired. Such a demonstration can explain a thousand words when teaching students the basic principles of the antenna from simple power point and OHP slides. Figure 1 - Example animation of a Yagi-Uda antenna used for television receivers Objectives of the project The aim of the project was therefore to expand on this idea and produce further animations to create fully operational online e-learning resource that will provide tutorial material that can facilitate a student s deep learning or even an achieving approach to teaching 3. The most significant effort required in this work will be to develop simulated animations that are 1 See 2 See 3 See B. C. Dart, J. A. Clarke, Helping students become better learners: a case study in teacher education, Higher Education, no. 22, pp , 1991.

5 purpose designed for teaching the module in a way that students themselves can demonstrate the concepts they have learned. The module was be delivered during Autumn 2008 and resources were delivered through ULearn to the students at an appropriate point during the semester so they could undertake their own self study from what was taught in the lectures. It was the intention to develop around 6 online learning tutorials with the animations contained in them (though in the end about 10 were developed). Some of these animations were also demonstrated in the lectures so that the students could refer back to them and absorb what they had learnt from the material delivered. Feedback was also going to be sought from the students as an important evidence base to investigate how the resources have enabled the students to deepen their learning and understanding of the subject. Such evidence could be gained from online surveys, tutorial results, student focus groups and reflective self evaluation. As an output of the project its aim was to consider a more detailed pedagogical approach to the method of teaching whereby the e-learning resources are purpose designed to support the learning experience of students undertaking the module that they fully compliment the lecture series delivered and the course book 4. Such a teaching practice could be an example that is equally applicable to other subject disciplines of science and technology such as particle physics, molecular biology and material stress analysis where much of the work is highly theoretical and cannot be demonstrated in simple visual means or by experimentation in a laboratory. A rough time schedule of the project is summarised in Table 1 which took place from September 2008 through to January 2009 as the practical aspect of the work and then the collation of results and report writing took place following that. Period September to mid October 2008 Tasks Deepening of familiarisation with Ansoft HFSS and other techniques to make animated images with other software such as Microsoft Power Point. Mid October to November 2008 end December 2008 Start January and February 2909 March and April 2009 To produce the animations as appropriate and the supporting HTML files from which a tutorial could be developed. Upload and publicise the tutorials online for students to use and interact with from which results could be obtained via ULearn of their usage. Send out questionnaires for evaluation and discussion topics. Collation of results and report writing as well as other means of dissemination. Collection of final results and writing up of report. Table 1 - Summary of the time schedule 4 S. R. Saunders, A. Aragon-Zavala, Antennas and Propagation for Wireless Communication Systems, Second Edition, 2007, Wiley, UK.

6 Methodology of Tasks Having familiarised with the HFSS software as well as other means, index pages using hypertext markup language (HTML) were produced that could easily be uploaded with the animated images to ULearn and displayed clearly under the learning modules section. An example of this is shown in appendix II, where animated images exported from HFSS are integrated into the HTML and can take the student through a set of tutorials. In this case the student is taken through points regarding how EM waves can reflect off material as well as refract through material. In some cases it was more appropriate to use Microsoft Powerpoint 5 from which the slides generated in the software could be converted to a set of graphics interchange format (GIF) files and merged together in an animation using freely available software such as the Microsoft GIF animator 6. A third kind of animated pages that were made available I this project was the use of Microsoft Excel 5 spreadsheets that could be used to demonstrate a concept. An example of this is shown in appendix III where an Excel spreadsheet can be downloaded and it shows a chart plot of a theoretical model known as Plane Earth Loss. In this situation there is a theoretical equation that can be derived and given certain assumptions, this equation can be simplified to a straight line. This happens though at large distances by comparing the purple and blue lines in appendix III. What this tutorial does is that it gives the opportunity for the student to experiment by changing the input parameters clearly marked in red. In this case there are three parameters being wavelength, transmitter height and receiver height. All the other cells in the spreadsheet are set to be locked so the user cannot change them. The spreadsheet is downloaded from a web page where it leads the student to experiment with the facility in different ways to help enhance their learning. In the initial stages, a number of tutorials were set up and made available halfway through the module in October 2008 giving them over 6 weeks to use the facility before the examination. Initially ten tutorials were placed online though later on two more were added because as advised through a mentor meeting, it was discussed whether later on adding one or two tutorials based on realisation of two concepts that students understood the least was most appropriate. The ULearn facility used as a platform for delivering the material provided a helpful monitoring tool to analyse the time spent by students as well as when students were using the animated tutorials. Result of this usage are analysed in the next section

7 Analysis of Usage Within this section the number of visits to each tutorial page, the average and total time spent on each page and in general the number of hours students were spending using the facility and when. Number of visits The number of visits to each tutorial are noted in Figure 2 where it was found that significantly more visits were made to the pages containing lecture notes and slides than the tutorials. These are in the order of hundreds so they are not included on the chart in Figure 2 for clarity. There was, however, evidence that students were making use of the facility since the majority of students were downloading the tutorial sheet that they could fill in electronically and submit for marking should they wish to (though no student took the opportunity). For a class size of 20 students, only half of the students appeared to make use of the facility given that on average the tutorials had received around 10 visits from different students. Each visit in this case counts as from a different student Visits Antennas Tutorials Channels with memory and Doppler Multipath Fading Questions about Antennas Demonstrations of knife edge diffraction Adaptive Antennas Doppler and channels with memory Diffraction Scenarios Stage 4 - Eight Element Planar Array Considerations of antenna impedance and radiation Modelling multipath fading Antenna Array Tutorials Page Circular and Elliptical Polarisation Plane Earth Loss Reflection and Refraction Stage 2 - Other Two Element Arrays Stage 3 - Four Element Arrays Anechoic Chamber Animation Stage 1 - Simple Two Element Arrays The Hertzian Dipole Electronic Tutorial eemant_ulearn_tutorial Figure 2 - Chart showing the number of visits received on each tutorial page Average time spent on each tutorial In Figure 3, the average time spent on each tutorial is shown. In this case the average time is not presented in ascending order but in the same order as the chart for the number of visits to each tutorial so that it can be found out which ones visited attracted more concentrated attention. The highest time spent on two pages were concerning Channels with memory and Doppler and Questions about Antennas. In both cases, the pages were visited by only one person and so the average time is determined by the time that person spent. It is also very likely that they left those pages idle since one page was in fact a discussion board that was not used. These two results will therefore be omitted. Other than that, the usage is no more than 5 minutes on average for any given tutorial. The two tutorials where the most time was spent include Circular and Elliptical Polarisation and Reflection and Refraction.

8 Average Time Spent 00:28:48 00:25:55 00:23:02 00:20:10 00:17:17 00:14:24 00:11:31 00:08:38 00:05:46 00:02:53 00:00:00 Antennas Tutorials Channels with memory and Doppler Multipath Fading Questions about Antennas Demonstrations of knife edge diffraction Adaptive Antennas Doppler and channels with memory Diffraction Scenarios Stage 4 - Eight Element Planar Array Modelling multipath fading Considerations of antenna impedance and radiation Antenna Array Tutorials Circular and Elliptical Polarisation Page Plane Earth Loss Reflection and Refraction Stage 3 - Four Element Arrays Stage 2 - Other Two Element Arrays Anechoic Chamber Animation Stage 1 - Simple Two Element Arrays The Hertzian Dipole Electronic Tutorial eemant_ulearn_tutorial Figure 3 - Chart showing the average time spent on each tutorial 01:12:00 01:04:48 00:57:36 T o ta l T im e 00:50:24 00:43:12 00:36:00 00:28:48 00:21:36 00:14:24 00:07:12 00:00:00 A n te n n a s T u to ria ls M u ltip a th F a d in g D e m o n s tra tio n s o f k n ife e d g e d iffra c tio n D o p p le r a n d c h a n n e ls w ith m e m o ry S ta g e 4 - E ig h t E le m e n t P la n a r A rra y M o d e llin g m u ltip a th fa d in g C irc u la r a n d E llip tic a l P o la ris a tio n R e fle c tio n a n d R e fra c tio n S ta g e 3 - F o u r E le m e n t A rra y s S ta g e 1 - S im p le T w o E le m e n t A rra y s E le c tro n ic T u to ria l Tutorial Figure 4 - Chart showing the total time spent on each tutorial by all students together Total time spent on each tutorial The same plot has been made in Figure 4 for the total time spent by students altogether where it is as high as one hour in some instances. It should be noted, however, that in this case the idle time is not accounted for where students may have visited the page and then come back to it having done something else for a time. It is therefore not possible to ascertain how much of this time was spent actually reading the pages. It is very likely that as the time spent in total is significantly higher for Reflection and Refraction and Circular and Elliptical Polarisation that there was some considerable idle time on these two cases. It is therefore not possible to consider these tutorials as well used. There are, however, tutorials

9 that can be considered to have been used by some students where the length of time spent on them was minutes. These include Considerations of Antenna Impedance and Gain, Modelling Multipath Fading, Plane Earth Loss as well as tutorials on array antennas where all the pages associated with those added together demonstrate significant usage. Total hours spent by each student The data plotted in Figure 5 indicates that the time spent by each student in total rises to as high as six hours. There is however, only one student, s19, that has spent such lengths of time above the others (where the next maximum time spent is as high as two hours) so it is likely that much of this time spent was idle. Only seven others were spending more than half an hour using the facilities online and five of those were using the facility mainly within one week before the exam. Therefore just under half the class can be considered to have been actively using the facility while about a quarter of the students were using it intensively in their revision period. 07:12:00 Hours spent 06:00:00 04:48:00 03:36:00 02:24:00 Total Hours Hours up to one week before Hours one week before 01:12:00 00:00:00 s1 s2 s3 s4 s5 s6 s7 s8 s9 s10 s11 s12 s13 s14 s15 s16 s17 s18 s19 s20 s21 s22 s23 Student Figure 5 - Chart showing the proportion of total hours spent up to one week before an exam and finally one week before the exam

10 Analysis of Student Learning Experience The student learning experience was analysed in two ways being that of conducting an online survey which students voluntarily filled in as well as seeking input from student feedback. Survey information All the results from this survey are contained in Appendix I where in general there were 6-9 respondents to each question. Some students did not answer certain questions because they did not use the facility either at all or not very much. The following results, however, are gained as follows that summarise the outcomes: - The majority of students were using the resources close to the exam, as indicated in Figure 6 and also reflected in the usage analysis earlier in Figure 5. Thus use of e- learning is more evidenced to be a revision tool, not so much as a regular feature. - Given that the analysis of usage indicated many students were using the facility to download lecture notes and slides, it was asked why this was so in question 4. Reasons were given mainly to the effect that it was handy to have as an electronic resource on their computer as well as the hardcopy versions that they had been given in the lecture. - Question 5 asked about animations for the antennas part of the course that were not used in the lectures but they were accessible online. Some noted the tutorial on Array antennas being especially useful since they are difficult to explain in writing or by slides in a lecture so the animated views helped to significantly explain the concepts. This can be identified as a tutorial that had some impact to the four students that had used it. - The tutorial entitled Antenna impedance and Gain, also in question 5, was also evidenced as helpful for the three students who used it, which was a tutorial produced later on to help students realise what they had not understood in the laboratory. This therefore can be identified as usable in the following year to help students better understand and apply what they are supposed to learn in the laboratory session. - In the propagation animated tutorials in question 6, which were largely used in the lectures also, the tutorials on Polarisation, Diffraction Scenarios and Principles of Diffraction were seen to be particularly useful. These subject areas were identified in the lectures as difficult for students to grasp and as such the final tutorial Principles of Diffraction was produced based on this premise. Though ULearn does not indicate a large amount of usage on this tutorial, the students themselves give a positive response to it. - Nearly half of the students responded that navigation around ULearn was moderate while others that responded found it straight foward as shown in Table 6. - The response of students was in some ways negative that they were forced to use the facility as a tutorial rather than a piece of textual information. A student commented in particular in question 10 that the asked questions needed more deep study to answer, which evidences that the facility was pushing students to learn, and to a deeper level.

11 Student Discussion A short focus group meeting with two students taking approximately 40 minutes was held before completing this report in order to pick up on some of the key outcomes of the student survey but also to pick up on how the learning experience was enhanced for two individual students using the facility. From this discussion the following points were raised regarding how the material was helpful or had room for improvement: There were clear examples, most notably the tutorial on array antennas that helped explain a concept better than on paper or using a slide. Having animated and 3D images assisted greatly in understanding the concept better where it was otherwise hard to visualise. The two students agreed that it was more useful to log on and try the facility closer to the examination though it was a very helpful and supportive to their revision. It was suggested that a weekly tutorial using the e-learning facilities in some way or other would help increase participation. Presenting the animations in the lecture was definitely preferred, though it was indeed useful to have them later available online to refer back to. In particular the animations assisted in retaining attention much better during the lecture. Having interactive animations (for example in the array antenna case where a student could effectively construct an array and experiment with it rather than just see example cases) was considered an idea that would help their learning and realisation of how the array antenna is behaving. Summary of Findings From the feedback obtained, it is evident that there were one or two animations in particular that were identified to benefit the student s learning because those particular topics were far better delivered via an animated image rather than through paper notes or drawings shown in the lecture. There were clearly cases where they could be made more interactive and enable the student to experiment more deeply with their results and apply to problem solving. On the positive side it was clear that it enhanced the experience in the lecture and also was a helpful support in the revision period.

12 Self Evaluation Having implemented the tutorials, there are self evaluations that can be given as well of the facility whereby if it was done again, or worked on in the future, these are the points that would be improved: - The animated images can sometimes run too quickly and when looked at can be a strain to the eyes and lead to headaches if used too much at one time. Therefore using slower animations or possibly even buttons to change from one image to the next would alleviate this problem. - The location of the tutorials and navigation on ULearn, was not obvious and was also evidently confusing to some students based on the survey feedback in question 8 where a student also specifically noted the pages were muddled up. - Given that some students did complain about the pages all being tutorial based rather than information based, possibly having some being descriptive and other parts being tutorials may be of help. Furthermore the lecture notes could also be referred to at appropriate points to help assist the student in finding the information they require to understand the animated tutorial while at the same time better understand the lecture notes. - No students made use of the discussion board to provide feedback or questions. How to encourage them to use this in the future was considered a possibility. - Creating a bank of web links to useful websites around the world would also be of benefit and also to encourage students to suggest links would be of use since students will readily like to find such data. Conclusions and Recommendations In this project, a small set of online tutorials using animated images including the use of high-tech software, HFSS, were devised with the aim of providing a means to deepen students thinking. Though the uptake of the e-learning facilities made in this project was only by one quarter of the class, it is still the case that these students provided feedback that testified to have benefit for their learning particularly when focussing on specific concepts included in the syllabus that are otherwise not possible to fully explain through paper notes or with projected slides. The ability to animate such concepts had opened up the opportunity to actively assist students in understanding the concepts better. Furthermore it has encouraged students to deepen their study and relate the information they see on tutorials to what they have received in the lectures. Use of animations in the lectures as well as online has also proved to be beneficial to the students so such practice is encouraged to help convey the messages when such animations are used appropriately within other material covered. The outcomes of this project recommend that others in the science, technology and medicine areas may find the concept of learning of benefit to their teaching area. For anyone considering this concept the following questions can be considered: - Is the subject area being taught something that involves an object/concept that cannot be seen by the human eye or is otherwise invisible such as electromagnetic waves?

13 - Can pictures be drawn together that if animated would enhance the explanation of the small or invisible object/concept that is trying to be explained? - Can mathematical equations or textual explanations be suitably presented in a way alongside the animations that the animations help explain the equations/text and in vice versa? Providing the teaching material in such a way could help to stimulate or enhance the students interest in this way while the images at the same time could help explain 1000 words. - How can the animations be presented in a way that they enhance student interest and lead them to deeper learning? This is a difficult question to answer and may take several years of trial to deliver a teaching resource that does attract wide interest. - Does the animated learning provide the opportunity for the student to experiment with the online material? Is it set up in a way that the student could investigate the concept for themselves? A tool that facilitates such opportunity is very powerful. - Providing a demonstration in the class of where the online facilities are and how to log in and access the different components on ULearn or another website should it be used will possibly encourage more students to go back to look at the facility. - Is there a way in which you can encourage students to submit responses to questions online so that you have an opportunity to monitor their learning? Future Work It is the intention that these animated learning facilities will be used again in the forthcoming academic year. They will, however, be built upon as time will allow to produce further animated tutorials that students identify to be of benefit. In the longer term, beyond the year 2009/10, the curriculum and module choices available to students at level M will change so the resources developed will need to be re-worked to new syllabuses that evolve. On a practical level, the animations will be adapted possibly to allow the student to switch from image to image rather than the images change automatically. Should this be not possible they can change at a slower speed to avoid causing the student to have a headache/migraine when observing them. It has been evident form the student feedback that use of some of the animations in the lecture has been of benefit. Furthermore some of the tutorials provided in the class could be structured such that they cause the student to go and use the animations as part of their tutorial work. This would help encourage general usage before the examination period. A final strong suggestion from the student feedback was that a more interactive set of animations would help learning, whereby students could construct different scenarios for themselves possibly and thus develop their own thinking. The technical viability of this feature will require extra thought though it will be considered. Another criticism from students was that it caused them to have to read up their lecture notes/course material at a deeper level. This could be evidence to suggest deeper learning is being facilitated, though at the same time its presentation can hinder motivation, where a balance would need to be considered.

14 Appendix I Results of the student feedback survey 1. When did you find yourself using the ULearn facility most during the semester? 4 Response Percentage of Respondents Number of Respondents Little or not at all 22.2% 2 Occasionally 22.2% 2 Close to the exam 44.4% 4 Consistently 11.1% 1 Table 2 Results of when students found themselves using the facility most Little or not at all Occasionally Close to the exam Consistently Figure 6 Results of when students found themselves using the facility most 2. If you answered Little or not at all in the previous question, please give a reason Response Percentage of Respondents Number of Respondents Did not have time 33.3% 1 Did not see any use in it 0.0% 0 Found it too difficult to use 33.3% 1 Didn t know about it 0% 0 Other 33.3% 1 Table 3 Results of students who used the facility little One person responded who need not have done as they did not answer little or not at all to the previous question, though possibly someone found it legitimately difficult to use.

15 3. Please indicate which of the following you actually spent a significant amount of time using when you were online (please tick all that apply): Response Percentage of Respondents Number of Respondents Downloading lecture notes 66.7% 4 Downloading lecture slides 83.3% 5 Downloading tutorials 66.7% 4 Using animated tutorials 66.7% 4 covering the antennas part of the module Using animated tutorials covering the propagation part of the module 66.7% 4 Table 4 - Results of how students used the ULearn facility Downloading lecture notes Downloading lecture slides Downloading tutorials Using animated tutorials covering the antennas part of the module Using animated tutorials covering the propagation part of the module Figure 7 - Results of how students used the ULearn facility 4. If you did download the files of the lecture notes/slides/tutorials, was there any reason why you did this given that you were given paper copies in the lecture? The following responses were given: To have a record in my computer To have a softcopy on my pc Always like having a soft copy To have a copy in my computer Just to keep the record Just to have the soft copy as a back-up to paper copies

16 5. If you did use the animated tutorials on the antennas part of the course, did they assist your study and help you to understand some concepts more easily? Please state for each one below whether you remember them being useful or not. If you didn't use them please say so as well. There were six respondents to this question and they are listed in the following table in six columns and the responses they gave to each animation are shown if they gave an answer. Hertzian Dipole Anechoic Chamber Array Antennas Adaptive Antennas Antenna impedance and Gain Didn t Didn t Helped Useful Helped Absolutely use use a little useful Didn t Didn t Helped Yes it helped Very use use a little useful Didn t Didn t Helped Useful use use a little Didn t use Didn t use Didn t use Didn t use Helped a little Helped a little it was easy to understand different array configurations Fantastic, it enabled me to visualise what phasing is all about Yes it helped Useful Yes it helped Useful indeed Table 5 - Results of usefulness of the antennas tutorials Can t remember

17 6. If you did use the animated tutorials on the propagation part of the course, did they assist your study and help you to understand some concepts more easily? Please answer below. There were 6 respondents to this question who had to select on the 7 separate tutorials that were made being: Reflection/Refraction Polarisation Diffraction Scenarios Plane Earth Loss Multipath Fading 16 Channels w Memory/Doppler Principles of Diffraction For each tutorial students had to answer whether they used it or not, whether it was useful whether it wasn t, whether they remember it or whether the lecture demonstration was enough Reflection/Refracti on Didn't use No Yes Polarisation Diffraction Scenarios Plane Earth Loss Don't remember it Lecture demo was enough Multipath Fading Channels w Memory/Doppler Figure 8 Results of the usefulness of the propagation tutorials Principles of Diffraction

18 7. If there is anything you can remember about the animated tutorials that helped your learning please state them below. If there is any other way anything could have been presented to help you understand better please state that also. The following answers were given by two respondents: More text explanation would be better, only animations do not help me Antenna array animation helped a lot and it was very good but again its theory is a bit complex so I could not understand it totally through animations 8. Were the pages easy to navigate in the ULearn facility? Response Percentage of Respondents Very straight forward 42.9% 3 Moderate 42.9% 3 Table 6 - Results on the ease of nagivation Number of Respondents 9. Was the animated tutorial pages on ULearn generally well presented? The response 100% Yes. (The only alternative answer was No ). 10. If there is any further comment you would like to add that you think was not covered in this questionnaire. Please enter it below. Comments received by three respondents as follows: I very rarely used ULearn because most of the contents was handed to us in hardcopy during lectures or ed to us by the lecturer. The rest of the contents on Ulearn for this module seemed slightly muddled. Some times animation was a bit insufficient as the asked questions needed more deep study to answer especially Fresnel zone part. There is always an improvement opportunity, thus the explanations on the animations could still be more developed for easy understanding of the concepts.

19 Appendix II Example of Animated Page on Ulearn Figure 9 - Example of tutorial uploaded onto ULearn

20 Appendix III Example of animation using Microsoft Excel Figure 10 - Example of spreadsheet tutorial on ULearn