=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-1103/paper6
|storemode=property
|title=Feeler: feel good and learn better. A tool for promoting reflection about learning and well-being
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-1103/paper6.pdf
|volume=Vol-1103
|dblpUrl=https://dblp.org/rec/conf/ectel/DurallT13
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==Feeler: feel good and learn better. A tool for promoting reflection about learning and well-being==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-1103/paper6.pdf
Feeler: feel good and learn better
A tool for promoting reflection about learning and Well-being
Eva Durall1, Tarmo Toikkanen1
1
Learning Environments research group. School of Arts, Design and Architecture. Aalto
University. Helsinki, Finland
{eva.durall, tarmo.toikkanen}@aalto.fi
Abstract. In this paper we present Feeler, a design-in-progress tool for visuali-
zation of learning performance and well-being with the aim of fostering reflec-
tion and awareness. The project combines two currently promising areas such
as Personal Informatics and Learning Analytics in order to encourage learners
to reflect about their lifestyle and its impact on their learning capabilities. It is
expected that allowing learners to capture and visualize quantitative data about
their states and habits will offer them rich materials that support individual and
collective reflection-after-action processes. This project builds on participatory
design and a research-based design process. Currently, the project is in a prod-
uct design stage. The aim of the project is to develop a working prototype that
follows a slow technology approach that can be tested in learning contexts.
Keywords. research-based design, information visualization, reflection, aware-
ness, learning analytics, personal informatics
1 Introductory Scenario
Saga has difficulties to stay focused on her studies and she feels stressed because she
can hardly complete the tasks. In a tutoring session, Saga’s tutor suggests her that
doing some regular exercise could actually help her to stay focused. Although Saga is
skeptical, her tutor convinces her to use Feeler, a system that monitors her concentra-
tion levels and the amount of physical activity she has during a certain amount of
time.
Feeler combines a head band that tracks brain activity and smart textiles to visual-
ize the data. Small led lights are integrated in two wool wrist bands and they blink
when the person loses attention for a certain time. Thanks to this gentle reminder Saga
is more aware of her current capabilities and acts according to what her body needs.
The light signal helps her to decide when to change the type of task or take a break.
Data about exercise habits is registered through a mobile app. Information about con-
centration levels and physical activity is displayed in a screen. This allows Saga to
identify patterns between the amount of physical activity and how long she is able to
keep her attention. After a while of using Feeler, Saga realizes that after moderate
exercise, she is able to keep concentrated for longer periods of time. She discusses
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Feeler: feel good and learn better - ARTEL13
this with her peers and with her tutor and gets some suggestions about how to better
plan her schedules.
2 Quantified-Self: a Tool for Self-Understanding
In many societies, computers have become an everyday tool that has adopted diverse
forms: laptop, smartphones, tablets… The combination of these devices with Internet
access and sensors has allowed people to collect data about a myriad of personal as-
pects dealing with physiology, behavior, habits and thoughts. In this context, the
Quantified-Self movement has appeared as a way to develop self-knowledge through
data. The availability of measurable personal data can be used, as [13] highlight, “for
self-reflection to help people become more aware of their own behavior, make better
decisions, and change behavior”. (p.405)
Personal informatics, also known as Quantified-Self, has become quite popular in
fields dealing with sports and health. In sports, some of the currently well-known
body tracking products include Nike+ and its fuelband1, Fitbit2, RunKeeper3 and
Moves4. Concerning wellbeing, applications such as Withings5, HeartMath6, mind-
bloom7 and Ubifit Garden8 offer opportunities to users to learn about their progression
and undertake new challenges concerning healthy habits.
In the field of e-learning, learning analytics takes advantage of the possibilities of
data monitoring in order to understand and improve teaching and learning. Despite the
intention is to empower teachers and learners, some critical voices [2] have warned
that analytics could disempower learners by making them reliant on the institution
feedback.
Considering the key role of self-knowledge for self-regulation and metacognition,
self-understanding should be at the center of systems that monitor student data. In this
sense, some authors [5, 3, 10] have noted that learning analytics should be considered
as a tool for the student. Similarly, [17] highlight the need for a Self-Directed Learn-
ing approach in which students feel ownership, as well as they are able to self-manage
and self-monitor their own learning. From this perspective, everything should be ori-
ented to help learners to take control of their own learning processes and experiences.
In order to encourage self-understanding of learning processes, it is crucial to stop
considering learning as an isolated activity that does not interrelate with other aspects
of peoples’ lives. In general, educational institutions should understand that they are
only one venue where learning happens, and to utilize holistically the other areas of
life where their students are active. Qualitative aspects, such as the student’s well-
1
Nike+ fuelband. http://www.nike.com/us/en_us/c/nikeplus-fuelband
2
Fitbit. http://www.fitbit.com/
3
Runkeeper. http://runkeeper.com/
4
Moves. http://www.moves-app.com
5
Withings. http://www.withings.com
6
HeartMath. http://www.heartmath.com/
7
Mindbloom. https://www.mindbloom.com/lifegame
8
Ubifit Garden. http://dub.washington.edu/projects/ubifit
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Feeler: feel good and learn better - ARTEL13
being, might be worth to be taken into consideration since they can impact learning
performance. In this paper, we propose an innovative approach to learning analytics
since we combine data about well-being with learning performance. The research
question that drives this project focuses on how to foster reflection about learning
capabilities in relation to a person's well-being.
3 Visualizing the Data for Reflecting
Making sense of large datasets composed by numerical and textual information can be
handled much easier if the information is visualized. Due to the power of images for
synthesizing complex information, information visualization has been recognized as a
powerful tool for reducing cognitive load, offloading short-term memory, allowing
for easier comparisons, and generally facilitating inferences [16, 18].
According to [14], visualizations should be conceived as transformation processes
within the Data-Information-Knowledge continuum. From this perspective, Masud et
al. claim that visualizations are not merely the final outcome of representing data,
information and knowledge, but that they should be understood as a process since
they provide awareness, as well as social and reflective insights.
[7] have also highlighted the strength of visualizations as tools for sense making in
which information is collected, organized, and analyzed to generate knowledge and
inform action. According to these authors, sense making is often a social process in-
volving parallelization of effort, discussion, and consensus building. Some web-based
collaborative visualization systems that go in this direction are Sense.us, Spotfire9,
Wikimapia10, Many-Eyes11, among others.
Visualizing the data can be a powerful resource for supporting reflection, individu-
al or in groups, and therefore gaining awareness. Considering the strong link between
reflection and learning [15], we can anticipate that the reflections that take place
through the analysis of visualizations would lead to learning. In this sense, visualiza-
tions can trigger reflection-after-action processes helping the learner to develop new
understandings and appreciations [1].
Some of the research questions that emerge in this context, is how to make large
volumes of data meaningful for users. How should this data be displayed in order to
improve self-understanding, reflection and awareness? One answer to this question
can be found in the design philosophy underlying slow technology. According to [6],
slow technology responds to the need of actively promoting moments of reflection.
Reproducing their words “A key issue in slow technology, as a design philosophy, is
that we should use slowness in learning, understanding and presence to give people
time to think and reflect” (p.203).
The visualization of information dealing with learning and well-being through
smart textiles could be perceived as an object for reflection in the sense that it encou-
9
Spotfire. TIBCO Software. http://spotfire.tibco.com/discover-spotfire
10
Wikimapia. http://wikimapia.org
11
Many-Eyes. http://many-eyes.com
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Feeler: feel good and learn better - ARTEL13
rages the person to take some time to think about his/her habits. Smart textiles, also
known as electronic textiles or e-textiles, refer to the use of electronic components
and advanced fibers in garments [8]. Research on these kinds of smart textiles has
advanced during the last years and some applications can be found in the military and
medical sector (Georgia Tech Wearable MotherboardTM 12), work (PROeTex13) and in
sportswear (Nike Hyperdunk+14). Apart from that, smart textile applications can be
also observed in the entertainment industry (midi controller jacquet15), as well as in
fashion design 16 and arts communities (e-motion project17). Smart textiles offer great
opportunities, not only for capturing data but also for displaying it to the person in a
discrete, subtle and personal way.
4 Methods
To design tools that effectively assist self-reflection, it is crucial to understand how
people think about well-being and learning in relation to their everyday practices. For
this reason, the project builds on a research-based design process [11, 12]. It is an
iterative process characterized by the following phases: contextual inquiry, participa-
tory design, product design and prototype as hypothesis. The aim is to involve users
from early phases of the project in order to incorporate their expectations and needs.
In the contextual inquiry, designers focus on achieving a deep understanding of the
socio-cultural context of the design. The information gathered during this phase is
used to develop use scenarios that are discussed in participatory design sessions with
the people who later will use the designed products. Participatory design sessions
provide designers feedback and inspiring ideas that may inform the product design. It
is important to note that despite users contributions are key elements of the design
process, final decisions are taken by the designers. The transparency of the process
and the continuous tests and redesigns guarantee that participants’ views are consid-
ered throughout the process. However, designers are the experts that will make deci-
sions on the prototypes.
At the moment, 6 exploratory interviews have been realized to people aged be-
tween 24-60 years old that combine work and studies and that are concerned about
their well-being. The interviewees were asked to take some pictures and write a short
text about how they would represent well-being, health and mindfulness in their eve-
ryday life. Images and texts were adapted to a card layout and used during the inter-
views as a starting point of the conversation. The information gathered during the
interviews informed the participatory design session that took place during the 2nd
Multidisciplinary Summer School on Design as Inquiry18. The workshop helped to
12
Georgia Tech Wearable Mother BoardTM http://www.gtwm.gatech.edu/
13
http://www.ugent.be/ea/textiles/en/projects/afgelopenprojecten/Proetex.htm
14
Nike Hyperdunk+. http://swoo.sh/17nJBtl
15
Midi controller jacquet. http://kck.st/ZX78u2
16
Fashioning technology. http://www.fashioningtech.com
17
E-motion project. http://www.design.udk-berlin.de/Modedesign/Emotion
18
2nd Multidisciplinary Summer School on Design as Inquiry. http://bit.ly/1cmOunJ
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Feeler: feel good and learn better - ARTEL13
gain insights of people’s understanding of learning and well-being, as well as to
brainstorm some ideas about what aspects could be worth to quantify and how to
visualize the data. In the short-term, next steps include the development of the con-
cept design, building of low-fi prototypes and the organization of more participatory
design sessions. The aim of the project is to develop a working prototype that can be
tested in learning contexts.
5 Feeler prototype
Feeler is a tool, currently still under development, that allows learners to monitor
some aspects of their well-being, such as the amount of physical activity and concen-
tration levels, in order to improve their learning. Feeler will combine data about per-
sonal well-being with metadata of learning materials such as the amount of time a
student has logged into the system and the times when she connected. The reason for
using learning analytics is for increasing understanding about the conditions in which
a person is more willing to learn.
It is expected that this tool will support learners’ reflective thinking about their
lifestyle and the impact it has in their learning capabilities. By focusing in a personal
matter such as well-being, the tool connects with some of the elements outlined by [4]
about reflective thinking: a state of perplexity, hesitation and doubt; (in case that the
data collected doesn’t correlate to the learners assumptions) and an act of search di-
rected to corroborate or to invalidate the suggested belief (people may feel motivated
to understand why the data collected by the system contradicts their initial thoughts).
The outcomes of engaging in such a reflection process about one’s well-being and
learning performance include (1) new perspectives on experience, (2) changes in be-
havior, (3) readiness for application, and (4) commitment to action [1].
Early prototypes of the suggested tool (fig.1) are based on the use of a headband
that monitors the brain activity, for instance the Melon band19 and a mobile app that
tracks physical activity (Moves5). The head band can register different states of men-
tal activity in order to determine a person’s level of focus. Information about how
much concentrated is the person for a specific amount of time would be displayed
through a smart wool bands placed in the person’s wrists. Depending of the concen-
tration level, some led lights would activate. The more concentrated you are, the more
intense would be the lights sparkling in the wool bands. Less levels of concentration
would be associated to less intensity of the lights. Information about physical activity
is monitored through the mobile app Moves. In this case, no specific action nor extra
device are required. Once downloaded the app, the person just has to carry her phone
wherever she goes and it will detect the type of activity performed (walk, run or cy-
cle), the duration and the distance travelled.
19
Melon. http://kck.st/13uYmbQ
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Feeler: feel good and learn better - ARTEL13
Fig. 1. Sketches of Feeler prototype.
Data about the level of focus and physical activity will be displayed together
through a screen (fig. 1). The intention is to allow the person to observe trends, get
into details and establish correlations. By offering the users different levels of read-
ing, we expect they would engage in reflection processes that can lead to meaningful
group discussions.
6 Conclusions
The underlying assumption of the research is that information visualization can be
a powerful tool for encouraging reflection and awareness. By drawing the attention to
learning and well-being, the project combines two currently promising areas such as
Personal Informatics and Learning Analytics. It is expected that allowing learners to
capture quantitative data about their states and habits will offer them rich materials
that support reflection processes.
Even if Feeler can be used in very different settings, we consider that the tool has
great potential in higher education since reflective practices help facing life’s chal-
lenges and encourages attention and analysis habits key for addressing the problems
of society [15].
Regarding the design of the prototype, slow technologies bring inspiring since, ra-
ther than designing for effective work, the aim is to foster reflection. In this sense,
some initial sketches focus on smart textiles for displaying the information following
a slow approach. In this sense, we consider that not only the tool, but the design as
well should support reflective practices.
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Feeler: feel good and learn better - ARTEL13
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