1. Improving Student Engagement With Educational Material Deon Takpuie Reitumetse Chaka Project Proposal

2. Aim Increase student academic interactions Gamification is the chosen technique Applied to the Vula forums and wiki tools

3. Problem Statement Good pass rates are key to University reputation It is desirable to achieve this cost-effectively Vula tools are underutilized (Donovan 2012)

4. Background Improving user interaction Human computer interaction heuristics University of Ulster uses gamification. Mobile device multimedia input and display optimisation. Eg: Micro-Blog (Gaonkar et al. 2008)

5. Research Questions How much quicker can forum access become via a suitably designed mobile interface? Is the gamified forum more usable and appealing the original tools? Do a gamified tools add value to the students learning experience as perceived by them?

6. Solution Approach Mobile o Optimising for Ubiquitous use: Improve ability to interact with the tools anywhere. o Optimising Mobile interface: Applying interface design to improve content delivery on tools. Gamification o Improving Participation: Applying a goal based layer into the use of Sakai tools. o Rewards System: Assigning participants a rewards and experience levels.

7. Forum Background Forums Background Improved pass rates at Ulster University Farmville has 40 million users

8. Wiki Background Research shows that voluntary participation has a positive influence on learnability (Greitzer et al. 2007)

9. Division Of Work Back End Models Controllers Front End (Wiki & Forums) Views Plugins Artificial Intelligence External Sakai (Vula) Interface

10. Solution Phase1 Paper prototype - Participatory Design Back End Work Phase2 Implement and test optimized forum tool Phase3 Wiki gamification and add Artificial Intelligence

11. Evaluation Plan Revolutionary testing for paper prototype Speed of performing popular tasks. Post user interviews to determine usability

12. Key Success Factors Navigation speed to access information Usability/Ease of use of tool Perceived value of tool to student

13. Risk Identification RiskImpactProbabilityMitigation Failure to meet project Milestones. HighMediumGood weekly planning and communication. Data loss.HighMediumBackup on external DB and/or cloud storage. Group member falls ill.Medium Share knowledge amongst group. Vula authentication and Interfacing. HighLowEarly testing of system and Vula administration. Ethical Permission Denied. HighLowApplication made as soon as possible. Conflict within the group. MediumLowConflict resolution communication.

14. Deliverables Web Presence Poster presentation Project Report Project Application Implementation

15. Timeline

16. Conclusion Possible to improve student engagement using existing tools Possible to improve usability and speed of Vula tools