Muhammed Ali ÖRNEK | Istanbul Technical University (original) (raw)

Papers by Muhammed Ali ÖRNEK

IDU SPAD’20 International Spatial Planning and Design Symposium, 2020

Game is a very old phenomenon and one of the factors that shape society and culture... more Game is a very old phenomenon and one of the factors that shape society and culture. In his book Homo Ludens, Johan Huizinga (1949) states that the game is actually older than the culture and games are indispensable for societies. According toComenius (1592-1671), “the game is a very important learning tool in the development of the child” (Koçyiğit, Tuğluk & Kök, 2007).In fact, terms such as gaming have been in our lives for a long time but Nick Pelling was defined “gamification” as a term in 2002. Gamification refers to adding game elements into non-game environments to engage and increase motivation for people to achieve their goals. This approach is a huge trend in various areas globally such as education, marketing, tourism and etc. The rising trend of gamification lays on increasing interaction levels by using game dynamics for non-game cases. For that reason, gamification is used when creating a new product or marketing a product such as corporations using for engagement and participation (Kavaliova et al., 2016). Gamification is also a form of learning; it is only slightly different from classical forms of learning. According to Ibáñez et al. (2014), employing gamification into learning activities dramatically improve the performance oftest scores and the learning outcomes for undergraduate computer science students. This research suggests using gamification to increase park visits and improve the experience of park users during their visits by employing the analog and digital methods.For that purpose, this research reviews the literature for case studies and applications on using gamification for engagement purposes in landscape architecture and related disciplines in terms of narration, role-playing, treasure hunting or geo-caching, immersion, loyalty, and awarding systems. As, this rese an outcome, this research aims to present a gamification concept by employing social media, which takes a critical role on engagement of public.

IDU SPAD'20 International Spatial Planning and Design Symposium, 2020

Serious games with their educational or skill development purposes besides entertainment, have be... more Serious games with their educational or skill development purposes besides entertainment, have been used in various fields such as architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, cultural heritage, and learning of language and culture, easing the data absorption process of the specific topic for the user. The use of serious games in the cultural heritage or cultural landscape, as a subtopic, can have a role in its preservation in addition to the information transition ability. Yedikule Bostans is a serious game designed for cultural heritage, its importance, and maintenance ways. The case study of this article is the İstanbul’s market gardens, existing plenty of them in İstanbul, which have remained since ancient times surviving despite the difficulties of urbanization. This research is focusing on the Yedikule Bostanlarıwith their 1500-year history which are associated with the Theodosian Walls, registered in the list of historic areas of İstanbul in UNESCO. The serious game presented in this researchwith its immersive text-based time-traveling theme about these gardens aims to attract the public's attention to their perishing danger. Thanks to the abilities of the Twine software used in the game's development, we provide a charming journey to the users throughout the game to increase their awareness of the inherited farming culture and more comprehensively the cultural heritage and cultural landscape, meanwhile.

THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2ND INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON VIRTUAL REALITY, 2020

In 1986, Brooks presented “Walkthrough”, the first possible use of Virtual Reality (VR) technolog... more In 1986, Brooks presented “Walkthrough”, the first possible use of Virtual Reality (VR) technology in architectural design. Today, NVIDIA partners with architectural firms to explore VR opportunities as a collaborative design medium of architecture. While universities could not have integrated VR technologies into curriculum of architecture and other design-related disciplines as easily, COVID pandemic can be used as an opportunity for leveraging design education in this medium. Although architectural visualization holds the records for being major use of VR technologies, VR applications have pedagogical potential like creative drawing and 3D modeling, and design thinking. VR applications such as Gravity Sketch, Google Tilt Brush,and Oculus Mediummay beutilized for sketching, design thinking and discussion in design studios. In addition, VR applications like Blocksand Kodonmay be used to create 3D models related with the designalternatives and site analysis. These applications allow students and educators to work from scratch and on a location-based map. These basemaps may be two-dimensional maps or 3D models of the project area. Educators can use photogrammetric 3D models to improve the perception of scale and volume instead of designing in 2D mediums. This research discusses the feasibility and benefits of virtual reality technology and applications to create a virtual learning environment for undergraduate architecture students.

5th International Scientific Research E-Congress (IBAD - 2020), 2020

The use of photogrammetry as a remote sensing method offers dramatic opportunities fo... more The use of photogrammetry as a remote sensing method offers dramatic opportunities for landscape architecture researchers, practitioners, students and managers. Beyond documenting the site inventories and site mapping, both obtained images, 3D points clouds, 3D mesh surfaces and all related data provide detailed site-specific context for design proposals. The constant development on capturing and modeling methodologies contributes significantly to the digital 3D documentation, mapping, conservation and representation of landscapes and cultural heritages and to the growth of research in this field (Murtha et al., 2018). Since the last decade, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) suchas quadcopters, also known as drones, can be obtained and operated easily compared to LiDAR and similar capturing methods. In landscape architecture discipline, UAV are used to document site inventory (Gerke, 2018; Yijing & Yuning, 2018), monitor biodiversity (Pietsch et al., 20180), evaluate the performance of park areas (Park et al., 2020), capture environmental data in built environment (Marschall et al., 2018), visualize the landscape (Wissen et al., 2019; Sedláček & Klepárník, 2019; Hill et al., 2019), documenting corals as underwater heritage (Vogler et al., 2019), explore new landscape design methodologies (Urech, 2019), enrich the curriculum of landscape architecture education (George & Park, 2020; Sedláček et al., 2020). This article presents the use of UAV and photogrammetry as a surveying method in landscape architecture design. The 3D surveying process and gathered data will be presented as a part of this research.

Journal of Digital Landscape Architecture, 2016

The aim of this study is to develop a plugin, which works in conjunction with Rhinoceros software... more The aim of this study is to develop a plugin, which works in conjunction with Rhinoceros software, that both estimates and reports storm water runoff. The plugin is initially developed based on the SCS Runoff Curve Number Method. The CN method is the most commonly used method for determining peak discharges from small drainage areas. The formula is traditionally used to size storm sewers, channels, and other storm water structures which handle runoff from drainage areas of less than 1 km 2. For this purpose, all data, such as land use description, hydrologic soil groups, cover type, runoff curve numbers, time of concentration in minutes, slope, drainage area, rainfall depth in 24 hours duration , unit peak discharge, rainfall intensity at time concentration, rainfall data for the different sites in Turkey, are important. Each is used as an input for the operation of the plugin which also takes sensitive design data, such as topographic, footprint, hard and soft landscape surfaces, from existing drawings and makes estimations. After obtaining all the necessary data and writing the plugin, a case study area in the form of a high density urban area in Istanbul, will be analyzed using the plugin. The accuracy of the results will be compared with the results we get from traditional calculations. The importance of the study derives from facilitating the process of storm water runoff estimation that is one of the outstanding factors of the architectural, landscape and urban design process related to sustainability. In addition, this research presents a user-friendly decision support and even decision-making tool by employing recent computer technologies by corresponding to the lack of research in literature. With this research, it is aimed both to accelerate and ease the estimation process in terms of storm water management, and also to create an evaluation and decision support system for designers.

Journal of Digital Landscape Architecture, 2016

Landscape grading is a highly critical topic in the landscape architecture curriculum, which prov... more Landscape grading is a highly critical topic in the landscape architecture curriculum, which provides crucial skills for students, such as three dimensional visual imagination, critical thinking, management and problem solving. This research aims to develop an educational video game as a learning support tool that helps undergraduate landscape architecture students to acquire the essential knowledge and skills for the basics of landscape grading. In addition, this research focuses on supporting the conventional education system by assisting students to gain essential knowledge and skills through achieving the given well-designed learning tasks. In order to enhance motivation and increase learning rate, this educational video game helps students to practice: (1) understanding of the contour map and its rules, (2) identifying the signature landforms and slope shapes, and (3) preparing landscape grading projects to solve storm water drainage problems. This research aims to facilitate the learning of landscape grading topics by visualizing the textual curriculum with three-dimensional models, instructional images and animations. This research also aims to engage students in the learning of landscape grading topics by employing the game mechanics by blending the conventional teaching tools with the opportunities of the gaming technologies. Moreover, the proposed video game presents an immersive self-oriented learning environment that allows students to learn actively by accessing information in a hyperlinked network rather than being listeners of streaming information. The importance of this research lies in the use of existing digital technologies to enhance the learning rate for landscape architecture education as a response of literature deficiency in landscape architecture. In this research, three problem-based learning scenarios were created based on the curriculum and divided into instructional and training tasks. The instructional tasks refer to the tutorial tasks, which focus on increasing the understanding and learning of content and encouraging students to engage themselves in the learning process by explaining through the clearly and well-defined instructions. The training tasks allow students to exercise in curricular topics by achieving the given tasks. In addition, the difficulty level of training tasks steps up gradually and mentoring support is reduced to help students to increase expertise on given topics. Afterwards, a three-dimensional educational video game was created based on the learning scenarios by reprogramming the OpenSimulator software using the LSL scripting language. A three-phased experimental study was conducted in order to overcome the deficiencies identified through evaluations of the prior study; the authors have improved the software. The new improved version was tested on two randomly selected groups (n=32) (control and experiment) of undergraduate landscape architecture students at Istanbul Technical University in order to evaluate the pedagogical and instructional effects of the proposed video game. As a result of the gathered qualitative and quantitative data, two-tailed paired samples t-test revealed that the experimental group scored 15.42 % higher points (m = 47.1800, s = 9.17499) compared to the control group (m = 31.7667, s = 4.62667), t(2) = 2.030, p≤.05.

Serious games have been used for educational purposes for over a decade. Classification studies o... more Serious games have been used for educational purposes for over a decade. Classification studies on serious games assist educators in identifying potential utilization areas of these games and guide them through adaptation processes. Until 2008, serious games were classified either based on their purposes or their application areas. In 2008, Sawyer and Smith introduced a new comprehensive system that classifies serious games by considering both criteria. The following year, Foster and Mishra (2009) suggested evaluating serious games according to their contribution on skills and motivation. Most recently, Djaouti et al. (2011) developed another classification system that considers interactions between games and players. Although these classification models considerably help to identify general educational potentials of serious games, they do not necessarily provide specific information for landscape architecture education.
This paper introduces an evaluation system that is developed to help identifying educational potentials and opportunities of serious games for landscape architecture education. The evaluation system reviews serious games according to their visual and technical qualities, and also their contribution to skill development. As part of our research, we also applied the developed evaluation system to 60 landscape-related computer games to identify game genres with pedagogic potentials specific to landscape architecture education. Our findings indicate that SimCity 4, Minecraft, Leafsnap, Build-a-Prairie, ASPIS Sustainable, and Thisissand could be the most promising games for employing in landscape architecture education. Moreover, we suggest developing tailored educational games for landscape architecture by utilizing game engines such as Unity, Unreal Engine 4, CryEngine, and Kodu Game Lab.

Abstract In Digital Game-Based Learning (2007), Marc Prensky defines the generation as " digital... more Abstract

In Digital Game-Based Learning (2007), Marc Prensky defines the generation as " digital natives " , who spent time using computers and smart-devices and grew up mostly in a human-computer interaction. In addition, Prensky claims that that interaction changed the way of cognition and learning of digital natives by presenting information in a visual-based information network, allowing students to gather data by hyperlinking this information, and rewarding them as a response to their performance. On the contrary, the conventional education system presents a stable, text-dominant information stream which disregards the needs of pupils.Consequently, Prensky suggests that the conventional education system should be adapted to the evolution of digital natives as recent learners. Moreover, he states that the digital game-based learning approach and video games are significant opportunities for this adaptation process and recent research and experimental studies approve the idea of using video game for educational purposes. This research aims to develop a virtual learning environment to facilitate and motivate the learning of landscape construction and grading topics by performing tasks in a video game-like environment. For that purpose, a three-dimensional virtual environment was set up using the OpenSimulator software. Afterwards, a learning scenario was created in accordance with the curriculum of these topics and simulated in this virtual environment by using 2D and 3D visual representations of tex-tual information. The learning scenario was based on a series of tasks beginning with introductory missions and progressively getting more difficult and requiring more specific information to assist students in developing their knowledge and skills. Moreover, a feedback module was programmed for simulating the effects of their decisions and providing essential information and guidance to students for producing and optimizing solutions in encountered problems. In conclusion, an experimental study was conducted to measure the instructional and motivational effects of the proposed virtual learning environment with 16 undergraduate students as part of " Landscape Construction 1 " course in Istanbul Technical University. The findings showed that the proposed virtual learning environment increased the learning motivation of subjects and raised the learning rate of subjects by 53.14 percent.

Özet
Marc Prensky, Digital Game-Based Learning (2007) kitabında bilgisayar teknolojileri ve akıllı ci-hazları kullanarak ve yoğun olarak bilgisayar-insan etkileşimi içerisinde büyüyen nesli " sayısal yerliler " (digital natives) olarak tanımlamaktadır. Prensky, bu neslin bilgisayar arayüzü ile kur-dukları etkileşimin beyin ve algı yapısının yanı sıra, bireylerin öğrenme yollarını tümüyle değiş-tirdiğini belirtmiştir. Bu değişimin neticesinde, bu neslin yazılı bilgiden ziyade görselleştirilmiş bilgiyi okuyarak, bilgi ağları arasında köprüler yardımıyla seçimler doğrultusunda ilerleyerek ve öğrenme sürecinde ödüllendirilerek öğrenmeye yatkın olduklarını belirtmiştir. Ayrıca, yazı odaklı bilginin baskın olduğu, durağan ve öğrencinin pasif rol aldığı mevcut eğitim sisteminin bu neslin ihtiyaçlarına cevap veremediğini ve bu değişime uyum sağlamasının gerekliliğini savunmuştur. Bu araştırmanın amacı, peyzaj mimarlığı eğitim müfredatında yer alan peyzaj konstrüksiyonu ve tesviye konularının öğrenimini teşvik eden ve kolaylaştıran işbirlikçi çalışmaya elverişli bir sanal öğrenme ortamı oluşturmaktır. Bu amaçla, OpenSimulator yazılımı kullanılarak bir üç boyutlu sanal ortam kurulmuştur. Sanal ortam içerisinde, peyzaj mimarlığı eğitiminde önemli role sa-hip peyzaj konstrüksiyonu ve tesviye konularının öğrenilmesini kolaylaştırmak amacıyla eğitim müfredatı bilgilerinin iki ve üç boyutlu görsel temsilleri oluşturulmuştur. Ardından, öğrencile-rin öğrenme sürecindeki hakimiyetinin arttırılması ve öğrenime teşvik edilmesi amacıyla eğitim müfredatı basit ve göreceli tanımlamalardan başlayarak kademeli olarak zorlaşan oyun-tabanlı görevlere dönüştürülmüştür. Bu sayede öğrencilerin karmaşık kavram ve problemleri algılamak için yeterli bilgi ve beceri birikimini kazanmaları amaçlanmaktadır. Araştırmanın diğer bir amacı da, öğrencileri konu hakkında bilgilendirip, ardından bilgi düzeyini ölçmekten ziyade, öğrenci-lere gerekli uzmanlık alanı hakkında sağlam bir bilgi yapısı oluşturmaktır. Bu amaçla, öğrenciler sanal ortamda verilen görevleri tamamlarken, verdikleri kararlara ilişkin geribildirimler aracı-lığıyla hem bilgilendirilmekte hem de çözüm önerisi geliştirme veya iyileştirme sürecinde öğ-rencilere rehberlik eden bir modül programlanmıştır. Son olarak, araştırma kapsamında geliş-tirilen model önerisinin güdüsel ve öğretici etkilerini değerlendirmek amacıyla İstanbul Teknik Üniversitesi'nde peyzaj konstrüksiyonu 1 dersi kapsamında lisans düzeyindeki 16 öğrencinin gönüllü katılımı ile bir deneysel çalışma yürütülmüştür. Bulgular doğrultusunda, tez kapsamın-da geliştirilen model önerisi katılımcıların sorularını doğru yanıtlama ortalamasını 53,14% art-tırmıştır. Anahtar Kelimeler: Peyzaj mimarlığı eğitimi, bilgisayar destekli eğitim, sanal öğrenme ortamları, oyun-tabanlı öğrenme.

Although the use of different digital technologies has significantly increased in design educatio... more Although the use of different digital technologies has significantly increased in design education, our literature review showed that there have not been sufficient studies conducted on utilizing virtual worlds as learning tools in landscape architecture. The goal of this study is to facilitate learning of basic landscape grading principles by visualizing the content in a three-dimensional virtual environment and allowing students to learn through experiencing topographical conditions in such an environment.
The earliest studies of educational usage of multi user virtual environments (MUVEs), Quest Atlantis (Barab et al., 2004) and RiverCity (Dade et al., 2004), were particularly developed for the education of science students. Both MUVEs helped students in developing scientific knowledge through the use of virtual worlds. In a recent study, Gül et al. (2012) conducted an experimental project on collaborative learning activity between architecture students in two geographically-dispersed universities. In this study, the MUVE platform was used as a design and communication medium between the participating students for developing a design project from scratch.
In our study, we utilized a virtual world through the use of Open Simulator platform, an open-source MUVE. Afterwards, we created a game-based virtual learning environment in which the students can learn basic landscape grading principles by completing a series of tasks through exploring the virtual world. Then, we conducted an exploratory study and evaluated the instructive and motivational effects of our proposed MUVE by gathering qualitative and quantitative data. The results indicate that employing MUVEs as didactic instruments within the landscape architecture education helps students to understand three-dimensional landforms by virtually experiencing them rather than reading the information from a traditional textbook.

Serious gaming approach and related researches shows that motivational and instructional features... more Serious gaming approach and related researches shows that motivational and instructional features make computer games promising educational tools. With the pioneer of educational institutes, many researchers have focused in this potential use of computer games in learning. Even major of them have been seeking answers for educationally beneficial factors of computer games, some researchers have developed educational games in specific learning topics. This study aims to introduce serious game approach and its foundations like digital game-based learning. Additionally, an experimental study was conducted to explore potential uses of computer games in landscape education. In order to this study, a commercial computer game has been played by undergraduate landscape architecture students.

B.E.N.A. 2012 Conference Proceedings, 2012

People living in commune have some necessities in public spaces. And urban furnitures became as a... more People living in commune have some necessities in public spaces. And urban furnitures became as an answer to these necessities. In history, they have been accepted as a cultural sign where they are using. As an example, Roman was building Victory Gates and sculptures of conquerors to conquests. For another example, classical red telephone boxes of Brits. In spite of being created by self-necessities and aesthetics of each society, urban furnitures replaced with less detailed, low cost mass production products during industrial revolution. Consumers who didn’t discontent with these mass manufacture products, inclined to user - based designed and produced products. This orientation of customers forced producers to take care of design and designers and conduced to beginning of some design trends like Bauhaus. This time period is a breaking point for urban furnitures as other design products. Our study aims to make students using instructional design methods in urban furniture design process.

IFLA 2011 Conference, 2011

Digital Landscape Architecture Conference 2011, 2011

IDU SPAD’20 International Spatial Planning and Design Symposium, 2020

Game is a very old phenomenon and one of the factors that shape society and culture... more Game is a very old phenomenon and one of the factors that shape society and culture. In his book Homo Ludens, Johan Huizinga (1949) states that the game is actually older than the culture and games are indispensable for societies. According toComenius (1592-1671), “the game is a very important learning tool in the development of the child” (Koçyiğit, Tuğluk & Kök, 2007).In fact, terms such as gaming have been in our lives for a long time but Nick Pelling was defined “gamification” as a term in 2002. Gamification refers to adding game elements into non-game environments to engage and increase motivation for people to achieve their goals. This approach is a huge trend in various areas globally such as education, marketing, tourism and etc. The rising trend of gamification lays on increasing interaction levels by using game dynamics for non-game cases. For that reason, gamification is used when creating a new product or marketing a product such as corporations using for engagement and participation (Kavaliova et al., 2016). Gamification is also a form of learning; it is only slightly different from classical forms of learning. According to Ibáñez et al. (2014), employing gamification into learning activities dramatically improve the performance oftest scores and the learning outcomes for undergraduate computer science students. This research suggests using gamification to increase park visits and improve the experience of park users during their visits by employing the analog and digital methods.For that purpose, this research reviews the literature for case studies and applications on using gamification for engagement purposes in landscape architecture and related disciplines in terms of narration, role-playing, treasure hunting or geo-caching, immersion, loyalty, and awarding systems. As, this rese an outcome, this research aims to present a gamification concept by employing social media, which takes a critical role on engagement of public.

IDU SPAD'20 International Spatial Planning and Design Symposium, 2020

Serious games with their educational or skill development purposes besides entertainment, have be... more Serious games with their educational or skill development purposes besides entertainment, have been used in various fields such as architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, cultural heritage, and learning of language and culture, easing the data absorption process of the specific topic for the user. The use of serious games in the cultural heritage or cultural landscape, as a subtopic, can have a role in its preservation in addition to the information transition ability. Yedikule Bostans is a serious game designed for cultural heritage, its importance, and maintenance ways. The case study of this article is the İstanbul’s market gardens, existing plenty of them in İstanbul, which have remained since ancient times surviving despite the difficulties of urbanization. This research is focusing on the Yedikule Bostanlarıwith their 1500-year history which are associated with the Theodosian Walls, registered in the list of historic areas of İstanbul in UNESCO. The serious game presented in this researchwith its immersive text-based time-traveling theme about these gardens aims to attract the public's attention to their perishing danger. Thanks to the abilities of the Twine software used in the game's development, we provide a charming journey to the users throughout the game to increase their awareness of the inherited farming culture and more comprehensively the cultural heritage and cultural landscape, meanwhile.

THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2ND INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON VIRTUAL REALITY, 2020

In 1986, Brooks presented “Walkthrough”, the first possible use of Virtual Reality (VR) technolog... more In 1986, Brooks presented “Walkthrough”, the first possible use of Virtual Reality (VR) technology in architectural design. Today, NVIDIA partners with architectural firms to explore VR opportunities as a collaborative design medium of architecture. While universities could not have integrated VR technologies into curriculum of architecture and other design-related disciplines as easily, COVID pandemic can be used as an opportunity for leveraging design education in this medium. Although architectural visualization holds the records for being major use of VR technologies, VR applications have pedagogical potential like creative drawing and 3D modeling, and design thinking. VR applications such as Gravity Sketch, Google Tilt Brush,and Oculus Mediummay beutilized for sketching, design thinking and discussion in design studios. In addition, VR applications like Blocksand Kodonmay be used to create 3D models related with the designalternatives and site analysis. These applications allow students and educators to work from scratch and on a location-based map. These basemaps may be two-dimensional maps or 3D models of the project area. Educators can use photogrammetric 3D models to improve the perception of scale and volume instead of designing in 2D mediums. This research discusses the feasibility and benefits of virtual reality technology and applications to create a virtual learning environment for undergraduate architecture students.

5th International Scientific Research E-Congress (IBAD - 2020), 2020

The use of photogrammetry as a remote sensing method offers dramatic opportunities fo... more The use of photogrammetry as a remote sensing method offers dramatic opportunities for landscape architecture researchers, practitioners, students and managers. Beyond documenting the site inventories and site mapping, both obtained images, 3D points clouds, 3D mesh surfaces and all related data provide detailed site-specific context for design proposals. The constant development on capturing and modeling methodologies contributes significantly to the digital 3D documentation, mapping, conservation and representation of landscapes and cultural heritages and to the growth of research in this field (Murtha et al., 2018). Since the last decade, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) suchas quadcopters, also known as drones, can be obtained and operated easily compared to LiDAR and similar capturing methods. In landscape architecture discipline, UAV are used to document site inventory (Gerke, 2018; Yijing & Yuning, 2018), monitor biodiversity (Pietsch et al., 20180), evaluate the performance of park areas (Park et al., 2020), capture environmental data in built environment (Marschall et al., 2018), visualize the landscape (Wissen et al., 2019; Sedláček & Klepárník, 2019; Hill et al., 2019), documenting corals as underwater heritage (Vogler et al., 2019), explore new landscape design methodologies (Urech, 2019), enrich the curriculum of landscape architecture education (George & Park, 2020; Sedláček et al., 2020). This article presents the use of UAV and photogrammetry as a surveying method in landscape architecture design. The 3D surveying process and gathered data will be presented as a part of this research.

Journal of Digital Landscape Architecture, 2016

The aim of this study is to develop a plugin, which works in conjunction with Rhinoceros software... more The aim of this study is to develop a plugin, which works in conjunction with Rhinoceros software, that both estimates and reports storm water runoff. The plugin is initially developed based on the SCS Runoff Curve Number Method. The CN method is the most commonly used method for determining peak discharges from small drainage areas. The formula is traditionally used to size storm sewers, channels, and other storm water structures which handle runoff from drainage areas of less than 1 km 2. For this purpose, all data, such as land use description, hydrologic soil groups, cover type, runoff curve numbers, time of concentration in minutes, slope, drainage area, rainfall depth in 24 hours duration , unit peak discharge, rainfall intensity at time concentration, rainfall data for the different sites in Turkey, are important. Each is used as an input for the operation of the plugin which also takes sensitive design data, such as topographic, footprint, hard and soft landscape surfaces, from existing drawings and makes estimations. After obtaining all the necessary data and writing the plugin, a case study area in the form of a high density urban area in Istanbul, will be analyzed using the plugin. The accuracy of the results will be compared with the results we get from traditional calculations. The importance of the study derives from facilitating the process of storm water runoff estimation that is one of the outstanding factors of the architectural, landscape and urban design process related to sustainability. In addition, this research presents a user-friendly decision support and even decision-making tool by employing recent computer technologies by corresponding to the lack of research in literature. With this research, it is aimed both to accelerate and ease the estimation process in terms of storm water management, and also to create an evaluation and decision support system for designers.

Journal of Digital Landscape Architecture, 2016

Landscape grading is a highly critical topic in the landscape architecture curriculum, which prov... more Landscape grading is a highly critical topic in the landscape architecture curriculum, which provides crucial skills for students, such as three dimensional visual imagination, critical thinking, management and problem solving. This research aims to develop an educational video game as a learning support tool that helps undergraduate landscape architecture students to acquire the essential knowledge and skills for the basics of landscape grading. In addition, this research focuses on supporting the conventional education system by assisting students to gain essential knowledge and skills through achieving the given well-designed learning tasks. In order to enhance motivation and increase learning rate, this educational video game helps students to practice: (1) understanding of the contour map and its rules, (2) identifying the signature landforms and slope shapes, and (3) preparing landscape grading projects to solve storm water drainage problems. This research aims to facilitate the learning of landscape grading topics by visualizing the textual curriculum with three-dimensional models, instructional images and animations. This research also aims to engage students in the learning of landscape grading topics by employing the game mechanics by blending the conventional teaching tools with the opportunities of the gaming technologies. Moreover, the proposed video game presents an immersive self-oriented learning environment that allows students to learn actively by accessing information in a hyperlinked network rather than being listeners of streaming information. The importance of this research lies in the use of existing digital technologies to enhance the learning rate for landscape architecture education as a response of literature deficiency in landscape architecture. In this research, three problem-based learning scenarios were created based on the curriculum and divided into instructional and training tasks. The instructional tasks refer to the tutorial tasks, which focus on increasing the understanding and learning of content and encouraging students to engage themselves in the learning process by explaining through the clearly and well-defined instructions. The training tasks allow students to exercise in curricular topics by achieving the given tasks. In addition, the difficulty level of training tasks steps up gradually and mentoring support is reduced to help students to increase expertise on given topics. Afterwards, a three-dimensional educational video game was created based on the learning scenarios by reprogramming the OpenSimulator software using the LSL scripting language. A three-phased experimental study was conducted in order to overcome the deficiencies identified through evaluations of the prior study; the authors have improved the software. The new improved version was tested on two randomly selected groups (n=32) (control and experiment) of undergraduate landscape architecture students at Istanbul Technical University in order to evaluate the pedagogical and instructional effects of the proposed video game. As a result of the gathered qualitative and quantitative data, two-tailed paired samples t-test revealed that the experimental group scored 15.42 % higher points (m = 47.1800, s = 9.17499) compared to the control group (m = 31.7667, s = 4.62667), t(2) = 2.030, p≤.05.

Serious games have been used for educational purposes for over a decade. Classification studies o... more Serious games have been used for educational purposes for over a decade. Classification studies on serious games assist educators in identifying potential utilization areas of these games and guide them through adaptation processes. Until 2008, serious games were classified either based on their purposes or their application areas. In 2008, Sawyer and Smith introduced a new comprehensive system that classifies serious games by considering both criteria. The following year, Foster and Mishra (2009) suggested evaluating serious games according to their contribution on skills and motivation. Most recently, Djaouti et al. (2011) developed another classification system that considers interactions between games and players. Although these classification models considerably help to identify general educational potentials of serious games, they do not necessarily provide specific information for landscape architecture education.
This paper introduces an evaluation system that is developed to help identifying educational potentials and opportunities of serious games for landscape architecture education. The evaluation system reviews serious games according to their visual and technical qualities, and also their contribution to skill development. As part of our research, we also applied the developed evaluation system to 60 landscape-related computer games to identify game genres with pedagogic potentials specific to landscape architecture education. Our findings indicate that SimCity 4, Minecraft, Leafsnap, Build-a-Prairie, ASPIS Sustainable, and Thisissand could be the most promising games for employing in landscape architecture education. Moreover, we suggest developing tailored educational games for landscape architecture by utilizing game engines such as Unity, Unreal Engine 4, CryEngine, and Kodu Game Lab.

Abstract In Digital Game-Based Learning (2007), Marc Prensky defines the generation as " digital... more Abstract

In Digital Game-Based Learning (2007), Marc Prensky defines the generation as " digital natives " , who spent time using computers and smart-devices and grew up mostly in a human-computer interaction. In addition, Prensky claims that that interaction changed the way of cognition and learning of digital natives by presenting information in a visual-based information network, allowing students to gather data by hyperlinking this information, and rewarding them as a response to their performance. On the contrary, the conventional education system presents a stable, text-dominant information stream which disregards the needs of pupils.Consequently, Prensky suggests that the conventional education system should be adapted to the evolution of digital natives as recent learners. Moreover, he states that the digital game-based learning approach and video games are significant opportunities for this adaptation process and recent research and experimental studies approve the idea of using video game for educational purposes. This research aims to develop a virtual learning environment to facilitate and motivate the learning of landscape construction and grading topics by performing tasks in a video game-like environment. For that purpose, a three-dimensional virtual environment was set up using the OpenSimulator software. Afterwards, a learning scenario was created in accordance with the curriculum of these topics and simulated in this virtual environment by using 2D and 3D visual representations of tex-tual information. The learning scenario was based on a series of tasks beginning with introductory missions and progressively getting more difficult and requiring more specific information to assist students in developing their knowledge and skills. Moreover, a feedback module was programmed for simulating the effects of their decisions and providing essential information and guidance to students for producing and optimizing solutions in encountered problems. In conclusion, an experimental study was conducted to measure the instructional and motivational effects of the proposed virtual learning environment with 16 undergraduate students as part of " Landscape Construction 1 " course in Istanbul Technical University. The findings showed that the proposed virtual learning environment increased the learning motivation of subjects and raised the learning rate of subjects by 53.14 percent.

Özet
Marc Prensky, Digital Game-Based Learning (2007) kitabında bilgisayar teknolojileri ve akıllı ci-hazları kullanarak ve yoğun olarak bilgisayar-insan etkileşimi içerisinde büyüyen nesli " sayısal yerliler " (digital natives) olarak tanımlamaktadır. Prensky, bu neslin bilgisayar arayüzü ile kur-dukları etkileşimin beyin ve algı yapısının yanı sıra, bireylerin öğrenme yollarını tümüyle değiş-tirdiğini belirtmiştir. Bu değişimin neticesinde, bu neslin yazılı bilgiden ziyade görselleştirilmiş bilgiyi okuyarak, bilgi ağları arasında köprüler yardımıyla seçimler doğrultusunda ilerleyerek ve öğrenme sürecinde ödüllendirilerek öğrenmeye yatkın olduklarını belirtmiştir. Ayrıca, yazı odaklı bilginin baskın olduğu, durağan ve öğrencinin pasif rol aldığı mevcut eğitim sisteminin bu neslin ihtiyaçlarına cevap veremediğini ve bu değişime uyum sağlamasının gerekliliğini savunmuştur. Bu araştırmanın amacı, peyzaj mimarlığı eğitim müfredatında yer alan peyzaj konstrüksiyonu ve tesviye konularının öğrenimini teşvik eden ve kolaylaştıran işbirlikçi çalışmaya elverişli bir sanal öğrenme ortamı oluşturmaktır. Bu amaçla, OpenSimulator yazılımı kullanılarak bir üç boyutlu sanal ortam kurulmuştur. Sanal ortam içerisinde, peyzaj mimarlığı eğitiminde önemli role sa-hip peyzaj konstrüksiyonu ve tesviye konularının öğrenilmesini kolaylaştırmak amacıyla eğitim müfredatı bilgilerinin iki ve üç boyutlu görsel temsilleri oluşturulmuştur. Ardından, öğrencile-rin öğrenme sürecindeki hakimiyetinin arttırılması ve öğrenime teşvik edilmesi amacıyla eğitim müfredatı basit ve göreceli tanımlamalardan başlayarak kademeli olarak zorlaşan oyun-tabanlı görevlere dönüştürülmüştür. Bu sayede öğrencilerin karmaşık kavram ve problemleri algılamak için yeterli bilgi ve beceri birikimini kazanmaları amaçlanmaktadır. Araştırmanın diğer bir amacı da, öğrencileri konu hakkında bilgilendirip, ardından bilgi düzeyini ölçmekten ziyade, öğrenci-lere gerekli uzmanlık alanı hakkında sağlam bir bilgi yapısı oluşturmaktır. Bu amaçla, öğrenciler sanal ortamda verilen görevleri tamamlarken, verdikleri kararlara ilişkin geribildirimler aracı-lığıyla hem bilgilendirilmekte hem de çözüm önerisi geliştirme veya iyileştirme sürecinde öğ-rencilere rehberlik eden bir modül programlanmıştır. Son olarak, araştırma kapsamında geliş-tirilen model önerisinin güdüsel ve öğretici etkilerini değerlendirmek amacıyla İstanbul Teknik Üniversitesi'nde peyzaj konstrüksiyonu 1 dersi kapsamında lisans düzeyindeki 16 öğrencinin gönüllü katılımı ile bir deneysel çalışma yürütülmüştür. Bulgular doğrultusunda, tez kapsamın-da geliştirilen model önerisi katılımcıların sorularını doğru yanıtlama ortalamasını 53,14% art-tırmıştır. Anahtar Kelimeler: Peyzaj mimarlığı eğitimi, bilgisayar destekli eğitim, sanal öğrenme ortamları, oyun-tabanlı öğrenme.

Although the use of different digital technologies has significantly increased in design educatio... more Although the use of different digital technologies has significantly increased in design education, our literature review showed that there have not been sufficient studies conducted on utilizing virtual worlds as learning tools in landscape architecture. The goal of this study is to facilitate learning of basic landscape grading principles by visualizing the content in a three-dimensional virtual environment and allowing students to learn through experiencing topographical conditions in such an environment.
The earliest studies of educational usage of multi user virtual environments (MUVEs), Quest Atlantis (Barab et al., 2004) and RiverCity (Dade et al., 2004), were particularly developed for the education of science students. Both MUVEs helped students in developing scientific knowledge through the use of virtual worlds. In a recent study, Gül et al. (2012) conducted an experimental project on collaborative learning activity between architecture students in two geographically-dispersed universities. In this study, the MUVE platform was used as a design and communication medium between the participating students for developing a design project from scratch.
In our study, we utilized a virtual world through the use of Open Simulator platform, an open-source MUVE. Afterwards, we created a game-based virtual learning environment in which the students can learn basic landscape grading principles by completing a series of tasks through exploring the virtual world. Then, we conducted an exploratory study and evaluated the instructive and motivational effects of our proposed MUVE by gathering qualitative and quantitative data. The results indicate that employing MUVEs as didactic instruments within the landscape architecture education helps students to understand three-dimensional landforms by virtually experiencing them rather than reading the information from a traditional textbook.

Serious gaming approach and related researches shows that motivational and instructional features... more Serious gaming approach and related researches shows that motivational and instructional features make computer games promising educational tools. With the pioneer of educational institutes, many researchers have focused in this potential use of computer games in learning. Even major of them have been seeking answers for educationally beneficial factors of computer games, some researchers have developed educational games in specific learning topics. This study aims to introduce serious game approach and its foundations like digital game-based learning. Additionally, an experimental study was conducted to explore potential uses of computer games in landscape education. In order to this study, a commercial computer game has been played by undergraduate landscape architecture students.

B.E.N.A. 2012 Conference Proceedings, 2012

People living in commune have some necessities in public spaces. And urban furnitures became as a... more People living in commune have some necessities in public spaces. And urban furnitures became as an answer to these necessities. In history, they have been accepted as a cultural sign where they are using. As an example, Roman was building Victory Gates and sculptures of conquerors to conquests. For another example, classical red telephone boxes of Brits. In spite of being created by self-necessities and aesthetics of each society, urban furnitures replaced with less detailed, low cost mass production products during industrial revolution. Consumers who didn’t discontent with these mass manufacture products, inclined to user - based designed and produced products. This orientation of customers forced producers to take care of design and designers and conduced to beginning of some design trends like Bauhaus. This time period is a breaking point for urban furnitures as other design products. Our study aims to make students using instructional design methods in urban furniture design process.

IFLA 2011 Conference, 2011

Digital Landscape Architecture Conference 2011, 2011