A fairly new website that is being utilized in many classrooms today is MobyMax.com. MobyMax is a multi-subject website covering the K-8 curriculum in reading, writing, phonics, math, social studies and science. There are activities on the site that address fact fluency, number sense, reading stories, vocabulary, language/grammar, sight words, test prep as well as science and social studies. There are two versions of MobyMax, a basic free version that will allow teachers and parents to register their children and have them complete all sections of the site and a paid one that gives access to the various student activities but also allows the teacher to access diagnostic testing, progress monitoring, assessments, drill down data, printable worksheets, rewards and games. While many of the activities hold true to multimedia principles, there are some activities that do not. One of the areas that MobyMax is weak is that the Reading Assessment that students may take begins its leveling at the third grade level yet this program is used by many younger students as well. For this critique, the Vocabulary module will be examined as it is the one that has the most weaknesses from a multimedia principle prospective. In the Vocabulary module, students are presented with a word and multiple sentences to choose the definition of the word from. There are no directions at this point although there are audio boxes on which the student can click in order to have the word and definitions read aloud. Feedback is given in the form of an animated check mark if the students chooses the correct definition. If an incorrect choice is made, no feedback is given. The voice in this module is not a human voice but rather a computer generated and very robotic sounding voice. According to Richard E. Mayer (2014), multimedia learning takes place as people build mental images from words (spoken or printed) and various types of pictures. Research supports the use of multimedia in education. The use of the read aloud coupled with the text and pictures follows the multimedia principle, which basically states that most people learn better from a combination of words and pictures than from words alone (Mayer, 1994). MobyMax relies primarily on the use of text and narration rather than the use of narration and animation which goes against the modality principle. This principle is based on the concept that people learn better from graphics and narration than from graphics and printed text or printed text and narration (Mayer, 2014). The primary source of information is through narration of printed text rather than from narration and graphics. While there are graphics, they are substantially smaller than the text and have less of a focus placed on them as students are introduced to the new vocabulary words. According to Kalyuga and Sweller (2014) when students are presented with the same information at the same time in different modalities, students will need to expel more working memory in order to try to process both sources of information at the same time. By having each word of the text read aloud without any form of cueing, there is an increase in extraneous cognitive load. When considering the type of cognitive load students using the Vocabulary module of MobyMax would experience, extraneous cognitive load is increased based on Kalyuga’s view (Kalyuaga, 2010). As students are building connections between the given vocabulary word coupled with its use in grammar and transferring this new knowledge into their working memory, the intrinsic cognitive load experienced would be overly taxing on the students at the level that this material is delivered. The directions for what the student is to do at each new screen is not presented immediately. For some of the activities, no directions are given at all. This increases the cognitive load placed on the students are they are trying to take in the information being presented to them while trying to figure out how to navigate the site. The use of print and narrations are generally discouraged based on Kalyuga and Sweller’s redundancy principle (2014), and this is the primary delivery method used in this module. For many of the vocabulary words, the graphics given are not the most engaging. The students will already be struggling with following along with the very monotone computerized voice read aloud and will have no engaging graphic to help attach value to the new vocabulary word. In dual code theory according to Clark and Paivio (Clark 1991), imagery processing is affected by instructions, the value of the material being studied, and the ability and tendency to use imagery (Clark, 1991). Children with low vocabulary skills will have a more difficult time acquiring these new vocabulary words because they will not have engaging graphics to help them to process an image of word or to place a use for it in their everyday lives. Also, according to Mayer (2003), as students are able to look at their interaction with computers in a social sense, they try harder to make sense of the material being presented by engaging in deep cognitive processing. The use of a robotic, computerized voice makes it more difficult for students to think of the computer as a social partner. Use of a human voice giving directions before beginning and during the read aloud portions would help students to see the computer as a social being and be better able to relate to it. Another area of weakness in the Vocabulary module is during the practice section. During this section, again no directions are given. The students are to match up the word to the definition but they are not told that they need to drag the word beside the definition. After completing this, they are given the word, the small graphic and a sentence in which they must place the correct vocabulary word. Having these three sources of information coupled with multiple sound boxes in order to have the information read aloud can produce a split-attention effect. The split-attention principle in multimedia learning was discussed by Ayers and Sweller (2014), in which they state that instructional split attention occurs when students have to split their attention between necessary sources and mentally integrate that information at the same time. The use of the graphic, the text and the read aloud text may increase cognitive load based on the redundancy principle as explained by Kalyuga and Sweller (2014). Matching the vocabulary word to an animated graphic instead of using the fill in the blank sentences could help to reduce the cognitive load and would be more conducive to learning. According to Höffler and Leutner (2007), when the word to be learned is explicitly depicted in an animation, there may be a difference in the learning between animation and a simple graphic. Johnson and Priest (2014) noted that based on the feedback principle, when students are learning new material, they learn better with explanatory feedback rather than corrective feedback. In this module of MobyMax, the feedback is corrective and then only given when correct response are made by the student. An improvement to the module would include explaining to a student why they missed a question, this would allow the students to repair knowledge that is faulty.
References Ayres, P & Sweller, J. (2014). The split-attention principle in multimedia learning. In R. E. Mayer (Ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning. (pp. 206-226). New York: Cambridge.
Clark, J.M., & Paivio, A. (1991). Dual coding theory and education. Educational Psychology Review, 3, 149-210.
Höffler, T., & Leutner, D. (2007). Instructional animation versus static pictures: A meta-analysis. Learning and Instruction, 17, 722 -738.
Johnson, C. & Priest, H. A. (2014). The feedback principle in multimedia learning. In R. E. Mayer (Ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning. (pp. 449-463). New York: Cambridge.
Kalyuga, S. (2010). Schema acquisition and sources of cognitive load. In J.L. Plass, R. Moreno, & R. Brünken, Cognitive Load Theory (pp. 48-64). New York: Cambridge.
Kalyuga, S. & Sweller, J. (2014). The redundancy principle in multimedia learning. In R. E. Mayer (Ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning. (pp. 247-262). New York: Cambridge.
Mayer, R. E. (2014) Introduction to multimedia learning. In R. E. Mayer (Ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning. (pp. 1-26). New York: Cambridge.
Mayer, R. E. (2003). Social cues in multimedia learning: Role of speaker’s voice. Journal of Educational Psychology, 95(2), 419-425.
Mayer, R.E., Sims, V.K. (1994). For whom is a picture worth a thousand words? Extensions of a dual-coding theory of multimedia learning. Journal of Educational Psychology, 86, 389-401.