The question “What is the evidence for teaching and learning?” is important issue. For example, the following types of evidence for teaching and learning can be mentioned; (1) The position that data expressed as acts of learning and thinking are evidence, (2) Mental states that are relatively easy to measure externally are taken as evidence, (3) The position that mental states that are difficult to observe externally are taken as evidence and (4) The position that state changes in the neuroscientific layer are used as evidence. In (1) to (3) above, the cognitive state itself is the object of estimation, and the potentiality of the observation object increases in order of depth. In contrast, position (4) takes the level of the information processing function that generates the cognitive state as evidence. In this paper, the author would like to examine the possibilities of learning support system research from the standpoint of (4). This paper is not a commentary aiming to summarize a certain research topic, but rather to present the authors’ ideas as important themes to be tackled by the Society in the future.

There are a lot of opportunities to have traffic safety education, which is indispensable for decreasing the risk of car accidents. However, it is quite hard for drivers who do not have any experiences of car accident to enhance their safe driving awareness. One promising approach to this problem is a driving simulator that provides drivers with simulated experiences of car accident. Although such experiences allow them to enhance their safe driving awareness, it could not give simulated car accident to be brought about by risk factors they have in mind. This paper proposes a driving scenario control model for driving simulator, whose purpose is to present adaptive simulated experiences of car accident according to drivers’ risk factors. This paper also reports a case study with the model. The results suggest that it could promote safe driving actions and awareness as immediate effect.

Object-oriented programming (OOP) features program extensibility which is obtained through basic concepts such as inheritance and polymorphism. To foster organization of knowledge about OOP, we investigate a learning design for learners to understand the “causal relationship” between the extensibility and the basic concepts. Since the extensibility of OOP is an “invisible nature” that it is not necessary to modify the higher-level program when extending the function, the design features comparison of OOP with procedural programing requiring “explicit” modification of higher-level program, intending the learners to be aware of the invisible nature of OOP. In addition, according to the first principle of instructional design, learners are asked to perform two program extension tasks: one in demonstration phase incorporating OOP/procedural-programing comparison and another in application phase in which learners are expected to reflect on the “causal relationship” between extensibility and basic concepts. As a result of control experiment concerning OOP/procedural-programing comparison, a significant difference in the understanding of the causal relationship was observed, suggesting the usefulness of the comparison.

In this paper, we propose a new class design for mastery-based flipped classrooms, transitioning the learning activities in the previous in-person classes to separate asynchronous/synchronous online learning activities without changing the structure of knowledge acquisition, utilization, and application, setting computer adaptive testing as a milestone of learning activities. We primarily focused on “learner Independence of learning time and learning ordinary” and the “higher learner learning outcomes” for modeling new class design. The proposed class design was then introduced into an actual university programming course and compared with the class designs of previous studies. In the case study, comparing results of the final exam and adaptive testing, our class design can allow the learners’ learning outcomes to be maintained and promote early knowledge acquisition for learners. Furthermore, the learning behavior in the asynchronous online activities confirmed that the learners demonstrated their learner independence for time and ordinal learning activity.

Several academic conferences have been conducted online in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. While online academic conferences have provided formal learning spaces, there remains a dearth of informal ones. We hypothesized that graduate students can enhance their learning through informal communication with their peers when attending online academic conferences. Based on Garrison's (2017) Community of Inquiry, we designed an online group-viewing environment for an academic conference and conducted preliminary research. This paper reports the results of additional research with an increased number of participants in an environment that underwent expert review to improve reproducibility and reliability. An analysis of the results of the participant questionnaire showed that online group-viewing enhanced social presence and provided learning opportunities. Nevertheless, improving teaching presence and cognitive presence to deepen their learning to the stage of integration or resolution was necessary—this aligns with the results of the preliminary research.