Lecture Notes in Computer Science- P68 doc

324 Y S. Lai, Y H. Chang, and P T. Yu The topology of multi-monitor in software was defined by Microsoft, which was called virtual screen [11]. Fig. 1 shows a possible arrangement of three monitors in software monitor topology [11]. Microsoft’s Object Linking and Embedding (OLE) automation provides an easy way to use and control the contents and functionalities of an existing Windows program. By means of the OLE technology we can easily com- bine the functions of another program into our own application systems [12]. That is, our system will have some useful functions from other existing applications. OLE automation is a technology that is used by programmers to define the interface of Component Object Model (COM) objects [13]. This interface can be handled by any application that understands the interface description. The interface description is a detailed description of the names of methods and properties a COM object supports, together with the description of each argument a method holds. From this description, you can connect and control each method and property an object provides. Monitor 1 Primary Monitor Monitor 2 Monitor 3 (0, 0) Visual Screen Monitor Technology Fig. 1. A possible arrangement of three monitors The OLE Automation includes a client and a server. The Automation client connects to the Automation server so that it can use the content and functionality supported by the Automation Server. Microsoft Office applications expose their functionalities as a set of objects. With OLE Automation, we can use the functionalities that Microsoft Office applications provide and we don’t have to develop our own program with the same functionalities. That is, our application has the presentation capabilities of PowerPoint, and we use the OLE Automation to integrate the presentation functions provided by PowerPoint in our proposed system. The Windows Hook function can be considered one of the most powerful features in the Windows system. With the Hook function you can catch windows messages, either in your own application or in other applications. The Windows Hook function is a mes- sage-handling mechanism for intercepting messages before they arrive at the target win- dow and modify or discard them. There are a number of different types of Windows hooks available. Each type provides a different aspect of the message-handling mechanism. 2.2 Multimedia Learning Multimedia learning provides multiple modalities of information for learners, includ- ing speech, printed text, static graphics, animation and video. It can offer many good Constructing a Multi-Monitor Displays System for Learning 325 forms to students. Mayer defined multimedia as the presentation of material using both visual and verbal [14] [16]. The Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning, proposed by Mayer, provides empirical guidelines that help instructional designers to promote meaningful learning. The theory is based on the following assumptions: dual channel, limited capacity, and active processing [15]. Words and pictures represent the teaching materials designed by instructional designers. Mayer defined words as teaching mate- rial presented in verbal form, such as using speech or printed text; and he defined pictures as teaching material presented in pictorial form, such as using static graphics or dynamic graphics. The Dual Coding Theory suggests that students learn best when both channels are processed together. For this reason, we hope to design a teaching-aided system that supports the verbal and pictorial form based on the multimedia formats while presenting and providing multiple multimedia formats. 3 The Structure of the MMD System 3.1 The MMD System Structure Instructional materials may consist of various multimedia modalities supported by different authoring tools. For example, Microsoft Word supports texts and pictures; Microsoft PowerPoint supports texts, pictures, animations and videos. Therefore, in- structional designers use several authoring tools to edit, modify, copy and paste the instructional materials at the same time. Here are several tools in common use: Mi- crosoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Adobe Acrobat and Web Browser. The MMD system supports several multimedia formats such as PowerPoint, MS Word, Excel, PDF, HTML format, as well as images and videos. In this study we use the OLE Automation technology to handle the four existing tools and implement our own Web Browser, Picture Viewer and Video Viewer. The MMD system integrates the above seven multimedia formats to produce a vivid instructional presentation in a multi-monitor environment. This way, instructional designers can directly take ad- vantage of the authoring functionalities supplied by the authoring tools. Fig. 2 shows the architecture of our proposed MMD system. 3.2 The Functions of the MMD Authoring Mode There are two major parts in the authoring mode: Object Container and Multi-Monitor Manager. The Object Container is a physical container supported by the teaching-aided system. It provides an interface that connects and controls the contents and functions of existing windows applications, such as PowerPoint, WinWord, Excel, Acrobat, etc., by using the OLE technology. The Multi-Monitor Manager manages the functionalities related to multiple monitors, removes the redundant Windows taskbar items and con- trols how educators deploy the authoring tools or calls them back. Fig. 3 shows what happens when educators open two authoring tools by using the Open/Close Option in the MMD authoring mode. 326 Y S. Lai, Y H. Chang, and P T. Yu Fig. 2. The MMD system architecture Fig. 3. The opened documents in the MMD authoring mode Constructing a Multi-Monitor Displays System for Learning 327 The main functions of the MMD system are listed as follows: Open/Close Option. To select which button will be pressed down so as to remind users to close the tool with the click of this button. Monitor Selection. To select which monitor will be the used monitor in advance. Windows Deployment. To select which tool will be the appropriate monitor ac- cording to the Monitor Selection button. 3.3 The Functions of the MMD Presentation Mode In presentation mode, the Multi-Monitor Manager handles the ways to capture the thumbnails of projection screens, to identify the order of monitors and to switch the mouse cursor to other monitors. The mechanism of thumbnail will be executed auto- matically while educators click the presenting buttons. The Multi-Monitor Manager will detect which monitor educators select, and capture the image of appointed monitor with two frames per second. Each frame will be shrunk by using the Halftone stretching mode in order to fit the size of corresponding Object Container [17]. The multiple-monitor presentation consists of four major parts: Multi-Monitor Manager, Asynchronized Presentation, Synchronized Presentation and Handwriting Controller. The Multi-Monitor Manager shows thumbnails of the different projection screens, so as to identify the order of the monitors and to switch the mouse cursor to other monitors. The Multi-Monitor Manager can capture the thumbnail image of the projection screens in real time and displays them within the Object Containers. The Asynchronized Event Controller in the presentation mode handles a series of different events corresponding to the presentation tools. Educators can control these events by using the Asynchronized Event Controller, which applies the OLE Automation tech- nology. The Synchronized Event Controller disables those synchronized events that are not supported by these tools. The Handwriting Controller will call the tool back to the primary monitor and capture the image of the primary monitor in real time, and then display successive fake images on the presentation projection screen. 4 Methods The pilot for test their learning achievement and presentation the MMD system was carried out in a remote elementary school in the geographic center of Taiwan. All children at the school received music learning from a music teacher. The participants were 64 students (with a mean age of 9.6 years) selected from a population of 4th graders. The participants were randomly assigned to the experiment groups (n = 32) and the control group (n = 32). Generally, in remote elementary schools in Taiwan teachers have to teach Mandarin Chinese, Science, Mathematics, Social Studies, Mu- sic, and other subjects. Therefore, the teachers were not expert in each of the subjects taught, especially not Music. 4.1 Instructional Design In this study, the experimental group adopted the MMD system to present the listening map to assist them in their music appreciation instruction. The teaching materials 328 Y S. Lai, Y H. Chang, and P T. Yu selected were mainly classical music such as ‘Fossiles’, ‘In a Persian Market’, and ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’. The instructional strategies include discourse analysis, music appreciation, and multimedia presentation. First, the instructor plays the music and briefly introduces the composer’s life story, melody cause, and an analysis of the musical form structure, the theme, and the musical instrument. Second, the instructor plays the music and uses the MMD system to present the words and the pictures si- multaneously, such as the music notation and the listening map, in order to reveal the characteristics of the music appreciation instruction for the experimental group. Fi- nally, the instructor adopts eurhythmics, the playing of a musical instrument, drama, and creativity to perform a situated story. Students experience and express the heard music with moving their limbs, and connect the mental process of the thinking devel- opment when they are teaching [18]. Thus they show their own feeling in various Eu- rhythmic ways [19]. The experimental group used the MMD system during music appreciation so that the other visual auxiliary material, the ‘listening map’, could be presented simultaneously to help students learn and experience the music. The control group was treated similar to the experimental group, but did not use the MMD system to present the additional visual auxiliary materials. They are as follows. 4.2 Instruments Learning achievement. The learning achievement in the study is students’ scores in the timbre, dynamics, rhythm, and melody [20]. The timbre is the essence of a sound pro- duced by different musical instruments or a voice. Dynamics express the power of the sound. Rhythm is the length of musical notations. Melody expresses the level of the sound. In the test method students listen to 10 pieces of music, Saint-Saens, Bizet, …, and Dukas. Each piece of music lasts about 30 seconds, and tests if the subjects can distin- guish the theme trend of the music, if they can hear which kind of musical instrument is playing, if the dynamics are stronger and stronger, weaker and weaker, or do not change, it they can distinguish if the music copper in the rhythm is long or short. Each music element has 10 points, for a total of 50 points. The higher the score the more the student has learned, and the lower the score the lower the learning achievement. Multimedia presentation. According to Yamamoto’s creativity to rewrite, the mul- timedia presentation includes 7 items written in Chinese with fluency, flexibility, originality, and elaboration [18]. Fluency is the total produced about reacting smoothly or generating lots of ideas. Flexibility means classifying or thinking from different ways. Originality is to generate novel ideas or uniqueness reactions that others are unexpected. Elaboration increases the detail to build on existing ideas. It is the higher to score, the higher students' creativity achievement is. The answers are scored using a Likert type scale, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). The internal consistency (Cronbach’s α) was .82. 4.3 Results The learning achievement shows that the learning by the experimental group was more effective regarding timbre and melody than the control group, t(62) = 2.388; p < .05; . features in the Windows system. With the Hook function you can catch windows messages, either in your own application or in other applications. The Windows Hook function is a mes- sage-handling. aspect of the message-handling mechanism. 2.2 Multimedia Learning Multimedia learning provides multiple modalities of information for learners, includ- ing speech, printed text, static graphics,. processing [15]. Words and pictures represent the teaching materials designed by instructional designers. Mayer defined words as teaching mate- rial presented in verbal form, such as using speech