Abstract:

This paper describes the background and discussion points to a poster presentation, which aims to highlight and scrutinize good examples of educational software. The exploration of this question – in the exact formulation "What are good examples of educational software?" – dates back to 2015, when the author posted it for open discussion on ResearchGate, a social network for researchers. At the time of writing, this question has more than 6.800 reads and received 27 responses containing lists, examples, links, recommendations and motivations for 40 (types of) named software, from professional researchers and educators in the field. An attendant aim is to bring these suggestions into an overview that can tell something more precise about what makes for "good" educational software, taking into account both the research literature and the respondents’ motivations. For this purpose, the examples were categorized by their main instructional function as suggested in previous literature, and further assessed by applying my recently introduced concept of Integral Digital Values (IDV). The result is a concretization of how we can recognize the implementation of relevant cognitive and pedagogical principles in well-designed educational software. Some identified aspects were how the software made use of meaningful representations, effective feedback, adaptivity and novel social configurations. More complex software systems were suggested as "good examples" with reference to their use of AI-techniques, conceptual modelling and/or learning analytics. These non-conclusive results serve to inform the on-going work of formulating scientifically grounded criteria for identifying and assessing key features of educational technologies, such as the reviewed software. In order to pursuing this discussion further, a number of resulting questions are suggested.

Keywords:

educational software, apps, evaluation, integral digital value, digital learning, IDV