Use of agent prompts to support reflective interaction in a learning-by-teaching environment

A learning-by-teaching environment (Biswas, Schwarz, Bransford et al., 2001), can be used to create a context in which student can play the role of tutor through teaching the agent tutee. Without meaningful feedback from the agent, there is no reason to expect student's engagement with the teaching interaction and growth in learning. This study tries to investigate the design of student-agent reflective interaction triggered by the agent prompts in a learning-by-teaching agent environment, Betty's Brain. A pilot study in using the prompts within the agent environment is undertaken. The result gives us some preliminary evidence that the agent prompt support on reflective interaction can be positive in enhancing student's learning when pursuing learning-by-teaching activities. Copyright © 2008 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.