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Designing for discovery learning of complexity principles
of congestion by driving together in the TrafficJams
simulation
Sharona T. Levy
1
•Ran Peleg
1
•Eyal Ofeck
1
•Naamit Tabor
1
•
Ilana Dubovi
1
•Shiri Bluestein
1
•Hadar Ben-Zur
1
Received: 13 March 2017 / Accepted: 4 December 2017 / Published online: 31 January 2018
Springer Science+Business Media B.V., part of Springer Nature 2018
Abstract We propose and evaluate a framework supporting collaborative discovery
learning of complex systems. The framework blends five design principles: (1) individual
action: amidst (2) social interactions; challenged with (3) multiple tasks; set in a (4) a
constrained interactive learning environment that draws attention to (5) highlighted target
relations. The framework addresses a persistent tension in discovery-based pedagogy
between offering students the freedom to initiate, experiment, and explore and provid-
ing them with tailored experiences with many instances of particular relations underlying
the target conceptual structure. The framework was realized with TrafficJams, a partici-
patory simulation in which students drive together. A class of high-school students worked
with TrafficJams over 2.5 h. The teacher’s role was to orchestrate the activity but there was
no explicit instruction of the traffic and complexity principles. The students completed pre-
and post-test questionnaires and their activities were observed and logged. In terms of
driving in the simulation, the students learned to drive in ways that reduced congestion in
traffic by decreasing lane and speed changes, and keeping their speed down. Even though
there was no explicit teaching, half of the students learned that car speed distribution alone
can generate traffic jams with no additional causes; and, keeping a safe following distance
from the next driver increases everyone’s speed. Our study suggests that the learning
environment partially met both the overarching design goal of constrained discovery and
the specific content goal of systems reasoning.
Keywords Complex systems Design Human factors Simulations Traffic
&Sharona T. Levy
stlevy@edu.haifa.ac.il
1
Faculty of Education, University of Haifa, 199 Aba Khoushy Avenue, Mount Carmel,
3498838 Haifa, Israel
123
Instr Sci (2018) 46:105–132
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11251-017-9440-2
Content courtesy of Springer Nature, terms of use apply. Rights reserved.