eTeacher: Providing personalized assistance to e-learning students

In this paper we present eTeacher, an intelligent agent that provides personalized assistance to e-learning students. eTeacher observes a student’s behavior while he/she is taking online courses and automatically builds the student’s profile. This profile comprises the student’s learning style and information about the student’s performance, such as exercises done, topics studied, exam results. In our approach, a student’s learning style is automatically detected from the student’s actions in an e-learning system using Bayesian networks. Then, eTeacher uses the information contained in the student profile to proactively assist the student by suggesting him/her personalized courses of action that will help him/her during the learning process. eTeacher has been evaluated when assisting System Engineering students and the results obtained thus far are promising.     

eTeacher: Providing personalized assistance to e-learning students

In this paper we present eTeacher, an intelligent agent that provides personalized assistance to e-learning students. eTeacher observes a student’s behavior while he/she is taking online courses and automatically builds the student’s profile. This profile comprises the student’s learning style and information about the student’s performance, such as exercises done, topics studied, exam results. In our approach, a student’s learning style is automatically detected from the student’s actions in an e-learning system using Bayesian networks. Then, eTeacher uses the information contained in the student profile to proactively assist the student by suggesting him/her personalized courses of action that will help him/her during the learning process. eTeacher has been evaluated when assisting System Engineering students and the results obtained thus far are promising.     

Multiple Mice based collaborative one-to-one learning

Exchange is a collaborative learning application, originally developed for wirelessly interconnected Pocket PCs, that provides support for students and a teacher performing a face-to-face computer supported collaborative learning (CSCL) activity in a Single Input/Single Display (SISD) mode. We extend the application to support a single display groupware (SDG) mode. In this new version, named Exchange-MM, three users each with their own mouse (Multiple Mice) interact on a single display with mediation by a technological network. The original collaborative interaction is maintained. We describe a collaborative learning activity and the software architecture that supports both interaction modes, and also present a usability analysis of the activity conducted with second-grade schoolchildren. The results show that as in SISD mode, in SDG with Multiple Mice (MM) the technological network improves communication, negotiation, interactivity, coordination and appropriability between members of collaborative learning groups.     

Effects of Collaborative Web Based Vocational Education and Training (VET) on Learning Outcomes

Considering the increase in need of skilled human capital, the vocational training and education through e-learning has widely been adopted all over the world. It serves as a major alternative for training and teaching professionals, technicians, skilled workers, amateurs and students who cannot manage regular college education due to time, cost and distance factors. Prior research focuses on learning enhancement from several perspectives like computer mediated methods, learning games, personalized learning environments and web based instructional design. The proposed work contributes to this debate by investigating the role of collaboration i.e. student–student and student–instructor interaction, support material, instructor's feedback and evaluating their effects on learning outcome and students' learning experience. The investigation is performed through a case study presenting four vocational courses offered in three consecutive sessions. The findings revealed that collaborative practices i.e. group work, team effort, in time instructor's feedback and consolidated support material enhances learning experience of student and contributes positively to the learning outcome.     

Personalized web-based tutoring system based on fuzzy item response theory

With the rapid growth of computer and Internet technologies, e-learning has become a major trend in the computer assisted teaching and learning field. Previously, many researchers put effort into e-learning systems with personalized learning mechanism to aid on-line learning. However, most systems focus on using learner’s behaviors, interests, and habits to provide personalized e-learning services. These systems commonly neglect to consider if learner ability and the difficulty level of the recommended courseware are matched to each other. Frequently, unsuitable courseware causes learner’s cognitive overload or disorientation during learning. To promote learning effectiveness, our previous study proposed a personalized e-learning system based on Item response theory (PEL-IRT), which can consider both course material difficulty and learner ability evaluated by learner’s crisp feedback responses (i.e. completely understanding or not understanding answer) to provide personalized learning paths for individual learners. The PEL-IRT cannot estimate learner ability for personalized learning services according to learner’s non-crisp responses (i.e. uncertain/fuzzy responses). The main problem is that learner’s response is not usually belonging to completely understanding or not understanding case for the content of learned courseware. Therefore, this study developed a personalized intelligent tutoring system based on the proposed fuzzy item response theory (FIRT), which could be capable of recommending courseware with suitable difficulty levels for learners according to learner’s uncertain/fuzzy feedback responses. The proposed FIRT can correctly estimate learner ability via the fuzzy inference mechanism and revise estimating function of learner ability while the learner responds to the difficulty level and comprehension percentage for the learned courseware. Moreover, a courseware modeling process developed in this study is based on a statistical technique to establish the difficulty parameters of courseware for the proposed personalized intelligent tutoring system. Experiment results indicate that applying the proposed FIRT to web-based learning can provide better learning services for individual learners than our previous study, thus helping learners to learn more effectively.     

Developing a context-aware ubiquitous learning system based on a hyper-heuristic approach by taking real-world constraints into account

In a context-aware ubiquitous learning environment, learning systems are aware of students’ locations and learning status in the real world via the use of sensing technologies which provide personalized guidance or support. In such a learning environment that guides students to observe and learn from real-world targets, various physical world constraints need to be taken into account when planning learning paths for individuals. In this study, an optimization problem is formulated by taking the relevance of real-world learning targets and the environmental constraints into account when determining personalized learning paths in the real world to maximize students’ learning efficacy. Moreover, a hyper-heuristic approach is proposed to efficiently find quality learning paths for individual students. To evaluate the performance of the proposed approach, the teachers’ feedback was collected and analyzed based on the learning activities conducted in an elementary school natural science course; in addition, the performances of the proposed algorithm and other approaches were compared based on a set of test data.     

Control in the teaching of structural engineering design

The paper describes a technique for monitoring the progress of students in large classes, working on substantial design exercises. It ensures that each student has his or her own unique version of the problem and that the work done is verified at a number of distinct stages. The student is still required to make his own decisions and to perform his own independent calculations. Verification does not necessarily imply that solutions are pre-determined; it is sufficient that student's responses should be self-consistent.The controlling computer program is divided into two parts. The first part, which is universal, provides the supervisor with the means of generating multiple versions of a project and allocates them to individual students; it compares student's responses with expected responses, and notes the progress made by each student. The second part contains the technical calculations and it is specific to the problem in hand.A typical application is described in which 40–70 students design the principal parts of a steel building frame in five stages. This has been done successfully in a real teaching environment for some years. A supplementary example shows how the method can be used for problems in which solutions are not pre-determined.Although the illustrations are related to design in structural engineering, the concept is perfectly general. The technique is applicable to any design exercise in which the validity of a solution can be subjected to numerical tests.     

Conceptualization,development and implementation of a web-based system for automatic evaluation of mathematical expressions

Assessment and feedback are important parts of the teaching and learning of mathematics; and in general, the process can benefit by the introduction of technology. MathDIP is a web-platform which provides automatic evaluation and feedback of each step of the solution of a math problem. The system incorporates a Computer Algebra System to perform the evaluation and a mathematical expression editor which allows the user to interact with the system using his/her own handwriting. This paper reports on the design, development and evaluation of the system. The usability results of its implementation on an Introductory University Mathematics course show good performance in design and functionality issues. Also, results show that in general, the students participating in the study have a high level of acceptance for the system and perceive that its use motivated and strengthened their learning of the specific math topics covered in the course.     

融合通用题目表征学习的神经知识追踪方法研究

知识追踪是一项评估学生学习过程中知识状态演变情况的任务。现有大多数方法都致力于探索不同的知识状态评估方法。然而,答题过程中更为基础的题目表征受到的关注相对较少。因此,该文提出了一种融合通用题目表征学习的神经知识追踪框架。具体地,该文首先设计了一种通用的题目表征方法,通过知识点、难度和题目独有特征来区分题目。然后,采用现有知识追踪方法同时捕捉知识状态演变并学习题目表征。最后,利用知识状态和待回答题目表征的内积来模拟回答过程。在三个真实数据集上的实验结果表明,该文方法可以在知识追踪过程中学习精确有效的题目表征,并且显著提升了基线知识追踪方法的性能,使其能够超过现有最优方法。     

A personalized learning theory-based cyber-security training exercise

Current enterprises’ needs for skilled cyber-security (CS) professionals have prompted the development of diverse CS training programs and offerings. It has been noted that even though enterprise staff is now more aware of security threats, the number of successful attacks against companies has all but decreased over the years. Several criticisms were raised against current CS training offerings, which often made them inadequate, or unable to change participants’ behavior and security attitude. One of the main factors CS training programs are often not very effective is the lack of engagement or motivation of participants. This is often the result of training not being tailored to the needs or preferences of participants. In our previous work, we tackled this issue by developing a personalized learning theory-based model for developing CS training frameworks. In this work, we utilize the model to develop two CS training exercises: two game-based scenarios using the CS training video game Cyber CIEGE and one table-top team exercise. The exercises are later tested by involving a group of 12 students from the Norwegian Institute of Science and Technology (NTNU) Information Security master’s degree program. According to the results of the experiment and the feedback from the students, students felt more engaged during the exercises due to having been participants in their development process. This has in turn motivated them to continue using the training tools independently in their spare time. Further research is recommended to establish whether the training development model is adequate for different target groups, as well as better performing than other models when developing full-fledged training programs.

     

Investigating face‐to‐face peer interaction patterns in a collaborative Web discovery task: the benefits of a shared display

Mobile computers are now increasingly applied to facilitate face‐to‐face collaborative learning. However, the factors affecting face‐to‐face peer interactions are complex as they involve rich communication media. In particular, non‐verbal interactions are necessary to convey critical communication messages in face‐to‐face communication. Through gathering discourse and non‐verbal interaction records, this study explores the peer interactions supported by two collaborative applications: one with mobile computers and the other with shared‐display groupware (SDG). The results show that the students tended to interact with each other according to a distributed and an unsocial interaction pattern when using the application with mobile computers. In contrast, the students who learned with the SDG demonstrated a shared interaction pattern, whereby they often jointly focused on and referred to the shared work. The analysis of the students' work further found that a higher level of discussion was generally associated with the shared interaction pattern. The results seem to support SDG as being useful in augmenting face‐to‐face peer interaction supported by mobile computers. The implications derived from the findings also support the argument that non‐verbal interaction records are useful for quantitatively and qualitatively analysing face‐to‐face peer interactions.     

An analysis of collaborative problem‐solving activities mediated by individual‐based and collaborative computer simulations

Researchers have indicated that the collaborative problem‐solving space afforded by the collaborative systems significantly impact the problem‐solving process. However, recent investigations into collaborative simulations, which allow a group of students to jointly manipulate a problem in a shared problem space, have yielded divergent results regarding their effects on collaborative learning. Hence, this study analysed how students solved a physics problem using individual‐based and collaborative simulations to understand their effects on science learning. Multiple data sources including group discourse, problem‐solving activities, learning test scores, and questionnaire feedback were analysed. Lag sequential analysis on the data found that students using the two simulations collaborated with peers to solve the problem in significantly different patterns. The students using the collaborative simulations demonstrated active engagement in the collaborative activity; however, they did not transform discussions into workable problem‐solving activities. The students using the individual‐based simulation showed a lower level of collaboration engagement, starting with individual exploration of the problem with the simulation, followed by group reflection. The two groups also showed significant differences in their learning test scores. The findings and pedagogical suggestions are discussed in the hope of addressing critical activity design issues in using computer simulations for facilitating collaborative learning.     

Client–server architecture for collaborative remote experimentation

Experience in teaching engineering related subjects has shown that a complementary approach combining theoretical and practical exercises is vital for effective learning. Increasingly, teaching institutions are offering remote access to distant laboratories as part of an overall e-learning strategy. However, the majority of remote access laboratories developed to date have suffered from a major deficiency, namely the provision of a web-based environment that accurately recreates the group working and tutor driven experience of traditional on-campus based laboratories. This paper addresses this issue and presents a client–server architecture, based on Web services and .NET remoting services, for an integrated learning environment for remote experimentation that allows students in disparate locations to simultaneously and collaboratively complete complex experimental exercises.     

作业评价系统的研究与设计

作业评价作为课程评价的一个重要方面,反映了学生在学习过程中的发展情况.本文在分析过程性评价、多元化评价以及个性化反馈理念的基础上,设计了基于Web的作业评价与反馈系统.将作业展示在学习平台中,通过自评、互评、教评层层递进的形式对学习过程进行多元化的全面评价,针对互动评价过程进行个性化反馈和指导,引导学生自我反思,调动学生积极性,促进学生全面发展.     

基于离群点检测的学生学习状态分析方法

针对高校学生工作者任务繁多且直接管理的学生人数众多,难于对每个学生进行个性化的学习指导的实际问题,提出基于离群点检测的学生学习状态分析方法,将有限的教育资源分配给最迫切需求的学生。使用基于密度的局部离群点检测算法对学生考试成绩数据进行挖掘,找出可疑离群学生,然后对可疑离群学生进行学习状态分析。案例研究结果表明,本方法能够有效地找出学习状态异常的学生,可以提升高校学生工作者的管理效率。     

基于本体的e-Learning环境个性化服务处理方法*

为了向e-Learning环境中的学习者提供符合其个性化需求的学习服务,结合本体论具有概念和关系定义明确的特性,提出了e-Learning环境中学习者的个性化情形本体模型和相应的学习者个性化服务处理方法,该方法综合考虑了学习者的认知状态和学习偏好,进行个性化的答疑和进一步学习的内容推荐。采用该方法实现的原型系统实验表明,可使学习者的学习更有针对性,可更及时有效地消解疑惑,从而提高了学习者的学习效果和效率。     

Stress, computer-based work monitoring and measurement systems: a conceptual overview

The design and implementation of computer-based work monitoring systems can result in changes in the organization, job and task. Electronic performance monitoring (EPM) systems are one type of change based on principles of work simplification and work rationalization. In this new work arrangement, control and coordination functions are allocated to the computer. The supervisor becomes a monitor of information and primarily provides negative performance feedback to the employee. The employee is constrained in his/her ability to use either job resources or social resources to meet the greater demands resulting from the system controlling the pace of work. It is proposed that these work arrangements provoke stress responses in employees that can result in short-term illness and potentially long-term changes in health status. Information enriched work environments are proposed as an alternative. These new work arrangements could improve job resources and social resources to manage job demands and reduce the potentially damaging stress responses. To provide a frame of reference we focus on the impact of EPM systems on the organizational and job elements involved in provoking individual stress responses. The impact of EPM systems on individual health is described using a psychosocial stress framework. Ergonomics interventions discussed include: participation in the design process; allocation of control and coordination functions between the computer and the employee; development of feedback systems; and work measurement and the development of performance appraisal systems.     

Personalization and Context Management

Supporting the individual user in his working, learning, or information access is one of the main goals of user modeling. Personal or group user models make it possible to represent and use information about preferences, knowledge, abilities, emotional states, and many other characteristics of a user to adapt the user experience and support. Nowadays, the disappearing computer enables the user to access her information from a variety of personal and public displays and devices. To support a new generation of contextualized and personalized information and services, this paper addresses the problem of context management. Context management is a new approach to the design of context-aware systems in ubiquitous computing that combines personalization and contextualization. The presented framework for context management integrates user modeling and context modeling, which can benefit from each other and give rise to more valid models for personalized and contextualized information delivery. The paper will introduce a base framework and tools for designing context-aware applications and decompose the underlying framework into its foundational components. As two illustrative application cases, the paper discusses implementations of an intelligent advertisement board and an audio-augmented museum environment.     

基于深度强化学习的智能灯个性化调节方法

提出一种基于深度强化学习的智能灯亮度个性化调节方法,综合考虑自然光亮度及用户位置对用户实际感受亮度的影响,动态计算并设置灯光亮度,以满足用户个性化使用习惯.在每次完成灯光亮度自动调节后,根据用户是否再次进行手动调节设定正、负反馈,训练强化学习模型逐渐拟合用户使用习惯.实验分别实现了DQN、DDQN和A3C三种算法,在基...     

基于视频与语音的多通道游戏用户界面系统

设计和实现了一套基于视频和语音的多通道游戏用户界面系统，以增强计算机游戏的交互性和游戏用户的沉浸感．系统新创建并有效地整合了基于视频与语音两种交互通道，其中包含脸部模型重建、头部姿态估计、汉语语音识别三个模块，可快速实现个性化的游戏角色脸部模型，并允许游戏用户使用头部姿态和语音命令实时控制游戏角色和游戏进展．测试和应用结果表明：该系统适用于普通游戏用户和实际游戏环境．