Learning with an interactive schematic in a virtual environment; the tomb of Lady Hao

Virtual environments are a promising new medium for presenting spatial and other information about groups of related objects. An archaeological excavation is an excellent example; it is important to know not only the artifacts themselves, but also their spatial relationships. In the Hao Tomb application, we use a stylized three dimensional model to display twenty-five objects found in the Chinese royal tomb of Lady Hao (K. Linduff, 1996). Strata of the site are represented as simple planes, and two dimensional icons are placed in relative positions approximate to where associated artifacts were found in the tomb. Users can perform visual queries to determine the attributes of the artifacts and to access background information. The Hao Tomb application is intended to be used as a teaching tool. After the interface was implemented, we conducted an experiment to evaluate its effectiveness. Test subjects were given the task of learning certain attributes of the objects found in the tomb. Subjects using the Hao Tomb application did significantly better than subjects given high quality printed information. (P=0.00) However, the small number of subjects and other factors make these results preliminary. This test is part of a larger pilot study, which paves way for a more in-depth study.