Effectiveness of an Online Simulation for Teacher Education
Source: Journal of Technology and Teacher Education, Vol. 22, No. 2, April 2014, p. 167-186.
This study evaluated the effectiveness of the simSchool (v.1) simulation as a tool for preparing student teachers for actual classroom teaching.
Twenty-two student teachers used the simulation for a practice session and two test sessions.
Data included objective performance statistics generated by the simulation program, self-rated performance data, and qualitative opinions and perceptions from participants.
The findings reveal that participants’ scores for their simulated students’ learning significantly improved between practice and actual simulation sessions with one student.
However, participants' learning scores significantly decreased as complexity increased between sessions with one student and five students.
Task appropriateness scores increased with practice.
Participant ratings indicated that overall they found simSchool to be a helpful tool for learning about classroom teaching and identified shortcomings in the user interface and simulation organization that should be corrected to improve its effectiveness.