Investigating the factors affecting students’ satisfaction in a programming course designed in 3d virtual worlds

The main purpose of this study is to understand the satisfaction level of students to teach the basics of programming in 3D virtual worlds and investigate the factors affecting their satisfaction. Multiple case study with three cases were conducted in three different educational programs: as curricular (Case-1), extra-curricular (Case-2) and after-school (Case-3). Satisfaction scale adopted from previous study was used to understand current level of satisfaction and semi-structured interviews were conducted with participants to reveal factors affecting satisfaction. Descriptive analysis of quantitative data showed that that the most satisfied students were those from Case-1 (M = 4.35), Case-3 (M = 4.28) and Case-2 (M = 3.99), respectively. Single case analysis of qualitative data revealed the factors increasing and decreasing satisfaction of the students. Apart from the story about the tasks, group study, object construction, having tasks, off-task activities, 3D environment and tour in the environment emerged as an increasing factor across all three cases at different ratios. Technical problems, studying alone, difficulty of the tasks, and avatar-related problems were the factors stated by some of the students across all cases as decreasing factors. Cross-case analysis provided a table which shows the similarities and differences among the cases.