How Interactivity Promotes Education

Interactivity for Education
Introduction
Interactivity in the classroom refers to a hands-on approach to education that facilitates active learning (Park, 2015). Active learning has been shown to strengthen students’ ability to acquire knowledge over time—more so than passive learning (Dobbs, 2011). Through interaction, which may occur with our without technology, students obtain a deeper understanding of lessons, retain information more effectively, and are able to better build on prior knowledge. Interactivity has been shown to be a productive method for teachers seeking to support student learning with applications that get students involved and engaged with the material in a meaningful way.
Thesis
This paper will show why interactivity for education is a beneficial method that educators can utilize to increase student performance, knowledge acquisition and academic success throughout a range of teaching environments, age levels, and disciplines.
Literature Review
Interactivity for education can be a boon at any level from primary education to higher education and across multiple disciplines (Guzman, Costa-Castello, Dormido & Berenguel, 2016). It has applicability in both traditional classroom learning and online learning. It is especially helpful for students because it encourages engagement and fosters direct interaction with course material and a commitment to personally taking responsibility for digesting the information presented to one. When interactivity is required of a student, there is a demand on the student’s part to respond in a personal way to what is presented.
Online Learning
Interactivity promotes student participation, especially in online learning where it can be difficult for teachers to assess student engagement (Park, 2015). However, as Park (2015) shows, there is a need for teachers and moderators to assist student learning in interactive terms in order to promote the acquisition of knowledge in online formats. In other words, the online format itself is not enough for students to be engaged: they require some direction, some coordinated exposure to content, and some method of engaging with the content that facilitates interactivity with their peers. Providing feedback in the form of peer responses and reviews is one recommended method that Park (2015) recommends implementing.
Huss, Sela and Eastep (2015) explore some of the barriers to interactivity in the online learning community: they show that teachers have demonstrated a “need to establish quality interactions throughout their distance courses” but have also “acknowledged barriers they perceive in attaining desired levels of human relationship” (p. 4). The barriers to attaining the desired levels of human interaction are, for example, time and space related primarily—but the nature of the medium of online learning is such that there is little an educator can do about overcoming these obstacles within the educational framework presented by distance learning courses. In spite of these obstacles, interactivity can be achieved, but in a limited degree—particularly because student interaction with teachers and other students is limited in terms of actual one-to-one time, face-to-face meetings, and time scheduling.
In spite of these barriers to developing interactivity in online learning, the need for it, as noted among educators, has been met with the development of some successful strategies. Huss et al. (2015) note that the keys to developing a strategy for interactivity in online learning consist of “collaboration, caring, and context when creating and teaching courses in an online environment” (p. 4). Collaboration facilitates interactivity by bringing people together to share ideas and communicate their experiences. Caring provides the impetus for interaction. And context provides the framework or guide for how students can interact.
The findings of Huss et al. (2015) are corroborated by Kent, Laslo and Rafaeli (2016) who demonstrate in their assessment of interactivity in online learning that the network is a major component to successful interactive engagement: “it is the network of interactions among content items and participants which drives a collective knowledge construction process” (p. 116). In other words, the network of exchange itself is what helps to facilitate the interactive process and foster engagement and relationship building among students. By linking content to relational interactivity, feedback distribution, and knowledge construction among the collective of students, educators can use the online platform as an instrument to overcome the inherent barriers within the medium. The obstacles that online learning naturally presents can become opportunities for enlarging and enhancing interactivity. For example, online discussions in which students and teachers engage with learning content, communicate via chat rooms or video, and share information in portals, direct messaging, and student-driven response papers are positive ways to facilitate interactivity (Kent et al., 2016).
The benefits of interactivity in online learning have been measured as well and have been shown in student performance assessments (Kent et al., 2016). Positive correlation has been identified between “various interactivity measures, taken from various learning communities, and a set of well-known learning assessment” (Kent et al., 2016, p. 116). Wei, Peng and Chou (2015) also provide evidence that interactivity in online learning promotes student acquisition of knowledge as measured by scores given in online discussions, exams, and group projects. Additionally, students themselves have indicated that they benefit from interactivity: “students’ self-reported use of interactive functions, students’ perceptions of the usefulness of interactive functions, and students’ actual-use logs” all indicate that their online learning performance is positively impacted by interactivity (Wei et al., 2015, p. 10).
Other means of measuring performance include actual-use logs, which refer to the number of occasions that students actually log in to an online course, the number of times that students examine or read their online learning materials, the number of times that students post in discussion threads in their online portals, and the number of times that students log in to examine their syllabus (Wei et al., 2015). Each of these interactive methods assists online and distance learning students in engaging more deeply with the material in an active learning method.
Interactivity in online learning is a helpful method of instruction, as it serves to group students together in ways that they would otherwise not be able to achieve. By not actually being in direct contact with one another, the interactivity is limited, but still highly effective in terms of allowing at least some communication and interaction to stimulate the engagement of the student.
The Traditional Classroom
Interactivity can also be used effectively in the traditional classroom setting to facilitate acquisition of knowledge and increase student performance regardless of the level of education or the discipline to which it is being applied. This has been shown to be the case especially in vocational instruction where virtual reality learning and man-machine interactive environments can assist students in practicing their craft in a controlled environment (Huo, 2016). Even in classroom settings in professional spheres, where workplace training exercises are required for new worker orientation and onboarding processes, interactivity has been recognized as being of substantial service to the learning process (Tian, Liu, Yin, Luo & Wu, 2015).
Computers and education have long been shown to increase student aptitude in the classroom, and this is where technology really comes into play in terms of interactivity in the campus-based learning environment (Raes & Schellens, 2016). Computer-assisted instruction for language learners, for example, has helped promote interactivity among students and foster a deeper acquisition of language objectives (Keengwe & Hussein, 2014). Computers as an interactive source allow students to have more time with practice lessons and also give students more motivation—especially younger students who want to learn using computers.
As students of this generation are more than likely already familiar with digital devices having been born into the Digital Era, it makes sense that these types of tools would be utilized in classroom environments to support interactivity. Computers can also support team work among students as they collaborate on projects using the Internet, educational software, digital media, and interactive media on computers (Keengwe & Hussein, 2014). The research has also shown that interactivity by way of computer technology in the classroom and computer-assisted learning has been useful in closing the achievement gap and helping students to meet academic standards across the nation (Keengwe & Hussein, 2014).
E-textbooks also offer students an option when it comes to interactivity in the classroom and can help support their cognitive development (Weng, Otanga, Weng & Cox, 2018). Weng et al. (2018) examined the effect that interactive e-books had on 7th graders’ learning and cognitive load by looking specifically at how multimedia interactivity aspects of e-books facilitated 7th grade students’ perception of their ability to learn, score well, and retain information as opposed to student usage of static PDF-oriented e-books. Two groups of 7th grade students were compared, with one group using the interactive e-book and the other group using the static PDF e-book in an environmental science class. The researchers used student surveys to collect data, as well as unit tests and interviews with instructors to obtain both qualitative and quantitative information. Students who used the interactive media reported having higher confidence in their learning load and experiencing higher learning scores than students who used only the static PDF e-book (Weng et al., 2018). These results should not be surprising as they indicate that active learning, as Dobbs (2011) points out is an essential process in learning that should be advocated in every classroom.
Roman, Thompson, Ernst, Hakuta (2016) show that interactivity in the classroom can be as simple as allowing students to use web-based learning tools like Wordsift to help them with their lessons. The key for students is the degree to which they are able to interact with the lessons and move on from one question to the next. The personalized pattern of learning that develops over the course of time can augment the educational experience so that the student is in a way following in the same footsteps as the Montessori method which is based on individualized learning—i.e., the student advances at the student’s own pace rather than at the pre-determined pace of the instructor. While standards and goals are still required to be met, the interactive learning process facilitates independent learning and helps students obtain confidence in their decision-making processes and cognitive development (Roman et al., 2016).
Interactive technology engages students, strengthens their ability to learn independently and at a faster pace, accomplish more and greater tasks, and manage their own learning experience (Dobbs, 2011; Keengwe & Hussein, 2014; Roman et al., 2016). While some barriers to interactive learning in the classroom may exist, just as they do for online learning experiences, the evidence shows that interactive learning can produce more confident learners and better learning outcomes over time and across a range of disciplines and learning levels (Dobbs, 2011; Raes & Schellens, 2016; Roman et al., 2016; Weng et al., 2018).
Some of the barriers that exist to interactivity in the classroom are related to training, resources, familiarity and assessment—but mainly these obstacles can be easily overcome with a little practice and some focus on integrating interactive technology into the classroom. With some schools, such technology may be difficult to obtain because of restrictive budgets, but in most cases some form of technology can be used, whether that includes interactive projectors, interactive software, or interactive readers with e-books that allow students to engage directly with them in a non-static manner (Weng et al., 2018).
Conclusion/Summary
Interactivity is beneficial in both online learning spheres and in traditional classroom environments. Although barriers to interactivity can exist in both formats, these obstacles can be overcome with technological assistance and aid, teacher training, and student willingness to get involved. The barriers, moreover, are minor in comparison to the opportunities for interactivity that exist in both learning situations.
In online education, interactivity can be achieved through a variety of different methods including the use of chat rooms, instant messaging, video messaging, peer responses, group work, online log-in sessions, and screen time for students and teachers. Content has to be coordinated with group work and individual engagement opportunities in order to achieve maximum interactivity, but the possibilities are extensive especially as online learning methods become more popular and technologically feasible for students around the world.
In traditional classroom settings, interactivity can be achieved through computer-assisted learning methods, online software applications that promote individual learning and engagement, and interactive e-books that allow students to develop independence, confidence and the increased perception of developing their cognitive abilities so as to give them greater security when it comes time to test.
The benefits of interactivity in education include a deepening of knowledge acquisition and relationship building among students and teachers, which facilitates engagement, the active learning process, and a greater retention and ability to perform at a high level. Assessments of student performance indicate that when interactivity is promoted in the learning environment, students score at a higher rate than when it is not available.

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