| Abstract [eng] |
Interactive internet maps are becoming more and more popular because mapping technologes are getting better and modern maps now have more economic benefits compared to paper maps. Moreover, nowadays more and more attention is being paid to integration of modern technologies in the education sphere because modern learning tools are often considered as much better than traditional tools. Because of these reasons, it is necessary to investigate the influence of the map publishing type on the effectiveness of learning map information. This type of research could help us to understand how to properly integrate modern technologies into learning process. The main aim of this final Master‘s thesis is to determine the influence of the map publishing type on effectiveness of perceiving and remembering thematic maps information. The research was based on the sociometric method. The effectiveness of learning thematic maps information was estimated using the following criteria: efficiency, effectiveness and satisfaction. Two groups of respondents participated in the research. The experimental group had to find answers to the given questions by using the paper maps while the control group completed the same tasks using an interactive internet map. Every group was consisted of respondends with different levels of education and different experience of map use. Specially for the research web application was developed. It consisted of a questionnaire and an interactive internet map which had the same content as the selected paper maps. The work consists of introduction, three chapters, conclusions, bibliography, summary in Lithuanian and English languages, and appendixes. The most important part of this work is the results chapter. In this chapter the findings of the sociometric study are being presented and analyzed. The research has showed that the influence of the map publishing type on effectiveness of perceiving and remembering thematic maps information depends on the experience of the interactive map use. Respondents who have less experience (especially pupils) learned thematic information less effectively by using interactive internet map than using paper maps while the results of profesional users (who has higher education degree in cartography and work in this field) were opposite. Moreover the research data was proper for evaluating the influence of map structure and cartographic methods to perceive thematic map information. The analysis of the research data has shown that the most significant perception differences using paper and interactive internet maps were affected by the most significant differences of map structure and cartographic methods. The results of the research has revealed that in order to improve effectiveness of learning thematic map information there is a need to pay more attention on improving pupils interactive map skills and geographic knowledge. Moreover, such solution could open new possibilies to integrate modern maps into education sphere. |
