Application of interactive agents in a web based historic preservation curriculum: usability and interaction design issues

Abstract

The online Historic Preservation Curriculum gives the students access to information about the courses offered by the Department of Architecture at Texas A & M University for the fulfillment of its certificate program in Historic Preservation. Educational materials and links to learning resources related to every course and an evaluation tool for the students to assess their understanding of the subject, are also presented within this experimental distance learning web site. The virtual learning environments created similar to the Historic Preservation Curriculum are gaining popularity worldwide. The World Wide Web (WWW) and its potential to create educational environments seems to be the best solution to provide individuals who cannot participate in a traditional class with access to educational materials. But are these virtual learning environments comfortable to interact with? Would we be able to have a natural dialogue with the computer just as we do with our teacher in class? Can we get valuable criticism or appreciation for our performance in the class? This research attempts to address the issues mentioned above. Efforts have been made to provide a human, conversational interface with the help of interactive agents¹, for a Historic Preservation online course with an aim to enhance the interaction of the student with the virtual learning environment. The validity of the concept and its effectiveness in the learning tasks is later assessed by means of an experiment. ¹Microsoft Agent Development technology has been used to incorporate agents within the online course.