The ARETE PBIS-AR app in action
Pilot 3 is in its 9th lesson in Italy and at the Boccone school in Palermo. The augumented character of the alien Arpro became an appreciated model of positive behavior in the real school contexts of primary and secondary school levels.
Students together with the alien Arpro had the opportunity to model their behaviors adapting it according to the different environments of the school. The students were able to learn making direct experience with the prototype of the PBIS-AR app that allows them to observe the alien Arpro performing different behavioural examples, such as "Greeting others" in the hallway, as shown in Fig. 1.
Fig. 1” Greeting others" in the hallway
The students, through the behavioural training path, learned, practised and reinforced nine behavioural expectations organised in three missions. The three missions allowed the students to practise the last three behaviours studied in the previous three lessons during the practice week.
Students, observing Arpro's example implemented the set of their behavioral strategies, putting it in action, obtaining rewarding to gain points among the different missions. The students with the help of the PBIS-AR app using the practice section tested everywhere the new behaviors with the aim to master and retain the lesson learned. Figure 2 shows two highlights of the use of the PBIS-AR application during a behavioural practice activity. In the first, Arpro models the positive behaviour to keep inside the backpack personal belongings. The augmented reality scenario allowed the students to observe the behaviour one or more times and then to reflect on what they observed by answering one or more reflection questions. Thus, the student, as in a competition, by correctly answering the questions gains points and advances mission by mission.
Fig. 2 Practice phase with the PBIS-AR app
In this way, behavior in the same way as other school disciplines becomes a subject of learning. The AR play an important role to enrich the behavioral lessons facilitating students to explore and interact with new behaviors to be included in their behavioral repertoire. The use of technology in this scenario become a useful tool to respect the personal students' pace of learning, allowing them to reflect, practice target behaviors and generalize it in others life contexts. The lesson takes shape in school environments and the alien Arpro becomes part of the school community (Fig 3).
Fig 3 A creation of the alien Arpro made by the Boccone School students
Giuseppe Chiazzese, Antonella Chifari Italian National Research Council – Institute for Educational Technologies
