Interdisciplinary Laboratory for Research in Didactics, Education, and Training

OPTIMATTPRO

OPTIMATTPRO.Analysis of learning activity in a simulated and real training environment: the case of driving a 1- or 4-horse carriage. Funding for a doctoral scholarship from the French Institute of Horses and Horsemanship.

The objective of this research is to understand the effects of using a complex simulator environment for driving a 1- or 4-horse carriage in a training situation with novice drivers. This simulator environment combines a video platform integrating a serious game and a reflexive simulator with educational situations in the field. The aim is, on the one hand, to better understand the process of developing driving skills and, on the other hand, to identify the potential of the various training tools and situations created to aid this development. In general, the challenge is to contribute to technological and scientific thinking on the design and effects of simulator environments. The hypothesis that these environments allow for the construction of an experience that is "sufficiently" analogous to that of a real situation (in its cognitive, interpretative, and/or emotional dimensions) while manipulating the parameters of the situation that support learning: removal of risk, adjustment of complexity in terms of time, scope of the environment, and degree of difficulty of the problems encountered will be tested and discussed. In order to also engage the motor dimension, which is essential in the activity of carriage driving in relation to trajectory intentions, the environment, and the engagement of the horses, a "problem-solving" simulator will be designed and tested with different training audiences using iterative loops.