RSS-based e-learning recommendations exploiting fuzzy FCA for Knowledge Modeling

Nowadays, Web 2.0 focuses on user generated content, data sharing and collaboration activities. Formats like Really Simple Syndication (RSS) provide structured Web information, display changes in summary form and stay updated about news headlines of interest. This trend has also affected the e-learning domain, where RSS feeds demand for dynamic learning activities, enabling learners and teachers to access to new blog posts, to keep track of new shared media, to consult Learning Objects which meet their needs.This paper presents an approach to enrich personalized e-learning experiences with user-generated content, through a contextualized RSS-feeds fruition. The synergic exploitation of Knowledge Modeling and Formal Concept Analysis techniques enables the design and development of a system that supports learners in their learning activities by collecting, conceptualizing, classifying and providing updated information on specific topics coming from relevant information sources. An agent-based layer supervises the extraction and filtering of RSS feeds whose topics cover a specific educational domain.     

Concept maps as the first step in an ontology construction method

A method is proposed to be used as the first step in the ontology acquisition process. This method is based on the use of concept maps as a means of expression for the expert, followed by an application that assists the expert in detailing the structure of the knowledge represented in the map. This application analyses the concept map, taking into account the map topology and key words used by the expert. From this analysis a series of questions are presented to the expert that, when answered, reduce the map ambiguity and identify some common patterns in ontological representations, such as generalizations and mereologic relations. This information can be used by the knowledge engineer during further knowledge acquisition sessions or to direct the expert to a further improvement of the map. The method was tested by a group of volunteers, most of them engineers working at the aerospace sector, and the results suggest that both the use of concept mapping as well as the refining step are acceptable from the point of view of the end user, supporting the claim that this method is viable as an option to reduce some of the difficulties in large scale ontology construction.     

Knowledge sharing behaviors in e-learning community: Exploring the role of academic self-efficacy and sense of community

The purpose of this study was to explore the structural relationships between knowledge sharing behaviors (KSB), academic self-efficacy (ASE) and sense of community (SoC) of university students in e-learning community. The study was carried out with students who joined Facebook learning community that was created for the Computing I course which was taught with blended learning method. Data were collected from 316 university students by utilizing three self-report instruments: KSB scale, ASE scale (sub-scales: ‘social status’, ‘cognitive applications’ and ‘technical skills’) and classroom community (CC) scale (sub-scales: ‘connectedness’ and ‘learning’). The path analyses with structural equation modeling (SEM) further verified that students’ KSB were related to their ASE and SoC in e-learning community. The results of the study revealed that the ASE and SoC of the students positively affect their KSB. And in terms of sub-scales, the connectedness to the community, learning perception in the community, the self-efficacy of the students on the cognitive applications in the courses and their social status in the community positively affect KSB. However, students’ self-efficacy perceptions on their technical skills affect KSB positively but its affect size was smaller compared to other sub-scales. Further research studies and implications are presented and discussed.     

基于知识管理理论的网络课程设计探究

针对当前网络课程中存在的资源内容积累、学习活动缺乏等问题，本文引入知识管理的理论与技术，提出基于知识管理理论的网络课程设计策略，为网络课程的设计提供借鉴与参考.     

Seven key decision factors for selecting e-learning

E-learning is increasingly being adopted as a routine instructional media, and has moved from a niche solution in the defence and aerospace industries, to one that is adopted across the vast majority of industries and within education worldwide. E-learning is not however suited for all types of learning outcome or for all instructional situations. In this paper we describe a new instructional media selection model which enables the assessment of suitability of e-learning to a particular learning outcome. Following a review of media selection theory, seven key decision areas were identified. These consideration areas are; Learning Task, Media Attributes, Grouping Strategy, Learning Context, Learner Characteristics, Instructional Management and Cost Effectiveness. The paper focuses on the identification of the key decision factors for selecting e-learning and the development of detailed guidance within each decision area to enable an assessment of suitability of e-learning to be made. Finally we outline the dependencies and interactions between decision areas to illustrate the compromises inherent in instructional media selection, and to produce a model of these inter-relationships.     

Building ontology based knowledge maps to assist business process re-engineering

Business Process Re-engineering (BPR) is being used to improve the efficiency of the organizational processes, however, a number of obstacles have prevented its full potential from being realised. One of these obstacles is caused by an emphasis on the business process itself at the exclusion of considering other important knowledge of the organization. Another is due to the lack of tools for identifying the cause of the inefficiencies and inconsistencies in BPR. In this paper we propose a methodology for BPR that overcomes these two obstacles through the use of a formal organizational ontology and knowledge structure and source maps. These knowledge maps are represented formally to facilitate an inferencing mechanism which helps to automatically identify the causes of the inefficiencies and inconsistencies. We demonstrate the applicability of this methodology through the use of a case study of a university domain.     

Formative computer-based feedback in the university classroom: Specific concept maps scaffold students' writing

Formative feedback can be regarded as a crucial scaffold for students' writing cohesive texts. However, especially in large lectures students rarely receive feedback on their writing product. Thus, computer-based feedback could be an alternative to provide formative feedback to students. However, it is less clear, how computer-based feedback should be designed to help students writing cohesive texts. For that purpose, we implemented three different computer-based feedback methods within an authentic large lecture class. We investigated effects of the format (outline versus concept map) and the specificity (specific versus general) of the feedback on students' perceived difficulty and the generation of cohesive texts. We found that specific concept map feedback was perceived as less difficult as compared to the general feedback or the specific outline feedback. Additionally, students who received specific feedback wrote explanatory texts that were more cohesive as compared to students with the general feedback. However, the format of the feedback (concept map versus outline) did not account for improvements of cohesion. Evidently, specific concept map feedback can be regarded as an efficient scaffold to provide cohesive explanations.     

Using management procedure gaps to enhance e-learning implementation in Africa

Management of Universities in Ghana have established good rationale for embracing e-learning as a new paradigm of educational delivery, and have demonstrated commitment by investing and building technology infrastructure necessary for e-learning. However, the approach to evaluate the institutional context as guide to successful e-learning implementation remains a problem. In the absence of standards for evaluation to guide the implementation process, this research investigated management approaches to facilitating e-learning implementation at a leading university in Ghana. To gain depth in understanding activities that support e-learning, a pilot survey was conducted. This was used to refine the research instruments. The survey questionnaire, interviews conducted, and institutional documents on e-learning activities provided depth of management practices that supports e-learning. The management procedures were then compared with some e-learning implementation best practice, and gaps were established.This paper has demonstrated that by using dimensional tools to establish procedure gaps in e-learning implementation, the short and long-term strategic plans will be put in perspective. The tool show how the university is moving from its current practices of educational delivery to e-learning or some blend. Universities with problems as discussed in this paper may achieve success by assembling an implementation team and a leader, determining the appropriate learning technology, clearly outlining the process of implementation and having an ongoing evaluation process to institutionalise the innovative e-learning approach. The policy and strategy document, showing the institutional position must include the pedagogical goals, infrastructure requirements, evaluation, collaboration with stakeholders, quality control, technical support, budget and funding and resource planning.     

支持企业知识共享的企业本体论及其获取

企业本体论是实现企业知识共享的基础。论文通过分析企业本体概念的结构层次和体现形式,提出了一种基于企业组织层次和业务流程的由底向上获取本体论的方法,增强了本体获取的完整性和简洁性。     

Mining marketing maps for business alliances

A business can strengthen its competitive advantage and increase its market share by forming a strategic alliance. With the help of alliances, businesses can bring to bear significant resources beyond the capabilities of the individual co-operating firms. Thus how to effectively evaluate and select alliance partners is an important task for businesses because a successful corporation partner selection can therefore reduce the possible risk and avoid failure results on business alliance. This paper proposes the Apriori algorithm as a methodology of association rules for data mining, which is implemented for mining marketing map knowledge from customers. Knowledge extraction from marketing maps is illustrated as knowledge patterns and rules in order to propose suggestions for business alliances and possible co-operation solutions. Finally, this study suggests that integration of different research factors, variables, theories, and methods for investigating this research topic of business alliance could improve research results and scope.     

基于Ontology的领域知识构建技术综述

随着知识资源的不断丰富, 对知识进行有效的组织和管理, 实现知识共享和重利用, 从而充分有效地利用知识资源是一项迫切的研究课题。Ontology 的知识组织方式通过提供对领域知识的共同理解实现知识共享, 主要从定义、功能、构建、应用、研究现状等方面对Ontology 进行了介绍分析, 并探讨了其研究方向和重点。     

Accessible e-learning material: a no-frills avenue for didactical experts

Different organizations adopt accessibility for various and diverse reasons. Interesting and inspiring as such reasons may be, it is important to ensure that the motivation for supporting accessibility is that it is the right thing to do, i.e. a commitment to the provision of equal opportunities for accessing resources for people with special needs. Among the various efforts for supporting the development of accessible e-learning material, most of them propose guidelines that prevalently address technical accessibility issues (such as the format and navigation of learning material) with little or no consideration for the didactical experts, and thus their didactical experience, in developing learning material. Moreover, the aforementioned guidelines tend to provide generic indications on alternative forms of didactical content for equivalent access to it. None the less, the sole provision of equivalent forms does not guarantee the retention of desirable user interface aspects and may therefore have a negative impact on learning effectiveness. While this paper acknowledges the role of such guidelines, it does propose that the didactical experts be provided with a non-technical recourse, improving their development of accessible e-learning content. By tapping into the experience of the didactical experts, this work provides them with an avenue leading to enhance the accessibility of e-learning material.     

A meta-analysis of e-learning technology acceptance: The role of user types and e-learning technology types

Existing literature in the field of e-learning technology acceptance reflects a significant number of independent studies that primarily investigate the causal relationships proposed by technology acceptance theory, such as the technology acceptance model (TAM). To synthesize the existing knowledge in the field of e-learning technology acceptance, we have conducted a systematic literature review of 42 independent papers, mostly published in major journals. Furthermore, in order to view the research context by combining and analyzing the quantitative results of the reviewed research studies, a meta-analysis of the causal effect sizes between common TAM-related relationships was conducted. The main findings of this study, which is the first of its kind, are: (1) TAM is the most-used acceptance theory in e-learning acceptance research, and (2) the size of the causal effects between individual TAM-related factors depends on the type of user and the type of e-learning technology. The results of the meta-analysis demonstrated a moderating effect for user-related factors and technology-related factors for several evaluated causal paths. We have gathered proof that the perceived ease of use and the perceived usefulness tend to be the factors that can influence the attitudes of users toward using an e-learning technology in equal measure for different user types and types of e-learning technology settings.     

Investigating e-learning system usage outcomes in the university context

This paper investigates the outcomes of e-learning systems adoption and use by conceptualizing three e-learning systems adoption outcome constructs namely perceived learning assistance, perceived community building assistance and perceived academic performance. Utilizing these constructs, the paper proposes a research model for assessing the possible outcomes of e-learning systems adoption and use. The study collected longitudinal survey data from 249 university students participating in hybrid courses using a popular learning management system, Moodle. Partial least squares (PLS) approach was then used to test the research model.The findings suggest that beliefs about perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use, and how an e-learning system is used influence students' perceived learning assistance and perceived community building assistance. In turn, perceived learning assistance and perceived community building assistance influence the students' perceived academic performance.     

基于本体的非结构化知识库系统研究

本文提出一种基于本体的非结构化知识管理系统框架.在该框架中,知识库由知识体和应用本体两部分组成,可解决知识的重用和共享问题.知识检索可以通过知识地图导航和自动检索两种方式完成,有一定的智能性.知识管理门户采用XML和XSL相结合的开发方法,具有动态特点.本文还对知识库的安全管理方法进行了初步研究,提出了一个可用的知识库安全管理解决方案.     

An intelligent tutoring module controlled by BDI agents for an e-learning platform

INES (INtelligent Educational System) is an operative prototype of an e-learning platform. This platform includes several tools and technologies, such as: (i) semantic management of users and contents; (ii) conversational agents to communicate with students in natural language; (iii) BDI-based (Believes, Desires, Intentions) agents, which shape the tutoring module of the system; (iv) an inference engine; and (v) ontologies, to semantically model the users, their activities, and the learning contents. The main contribution of this paper is the intelligent tutoring module of the system. Briefly, the tasks of this module are to recognize each student (checking his/her system credentials) and to obtain information about his/her learning progress. So, it can be able to suggest to each student specific tasks to achieve his/her particular learning objectives, based on several parameters related to the existing learning paths and the student’s profile.     

Knowledge graph embeddings for dealing with concept drift in machine learning

Data stream learning has been largely studied for extracting knowledge structures from continuous and rapid data records. As data is evolving on a temporal basis, its underlying knowledge is subject to many challenges. Concept drift,¹ as one of core challenge from the stream learning community, is described as changes of statistical properties of the data over time, causing most of machine learning models to be less accurate as changes over time are in unforeseen ways. This is particularly problematic as the evolution of data could derive to dramatic change in knowledge. We address this problem by studying the semantic representation of data streams in the Semantic Web, i.e., ontology streams. Such streams are ordered sequences of data annotated with ontological vocabulary. In particular we exploit three levels of knowledge encoded in ontology streams to deal with concept drifts: i) existence of novel knowledge gained from stream dynamics, ii) significance of knowledge change and evolution, and iii) (in)consistency of knowledge evolution. Such knowledge is encoded as knowledge graph embeddings through a combination of novel representations: entailment vectors, entailment weights, and a consistency vector. We illustrate our approach on classification tasks of supervised learning. Key contributions of the study include: (i) an effective knowledge graph embedding approach for stream ontologies, and (ii) a generic consistent prediction framework with integrated knowledge graph embeddings for dealing with concept drifts. The experiments have shown that our approach provides accurate predictions towards air quality in Beijing and bus delay in Dublin with real world ontology streams.     

Intelligent assistance for teachers in collaborative e-learning environments

Collaborative learning environments provide a set of tools for students acting in groups to interact and accomplish an assigned task. In this kind of systems, students are free to express and communicate with each other, which usually lead to collaboration and communication problems that may require the intervention of a teacher. In this article, we introduce an intelligent agent approach to assist teachers through monitoring participations made by students within a collaborative distance learning environment, detecting conflictive situations in which a teacher’s intervention may be necessary. High precision rates achieved on conflict detection scenarios suggest great potential for the application of the proposed rule-based approach for providing personalized assistance to teachers during the development of group works.     

An approach to usability evaluation of e-learning applications

Despite recent advances of electronic technologies in e-learning, a consolidated evaluation methodology for e-learning applications is not available. The evaluation of educational software must consider its usability and more in general its accessibility, as well as its didactic effectiveness. This work is a first step towards the definition of a methodology for evaluating e-learning applications. Specific usability attributes capturing the peculiar features of these applications are identified. A preliminary user study involving a group of e-students, observed during their interaction with an e-learning application in a real situation, is reported. Then, the proposal is put forward to adapt to the e-learning domain a methodology for systematic usability evaluation, called SUE. Specifically, evaluation patterns are proposed that are able to drive the evaluators in the analysis of an e-learning application.     

Surveying instructor and learner attitudes toward e-learning

The trend of using e-learning as a learning and/or teaching tool is now rapidly expanding into education. Although e-learning environments are popular, there is minimal research on instructors’ and learners’ attitudes toward these kinds of learning environments. The purpose of this study is to explore instructors’ and learners’ attitudes toward e-learning usage. Accordingly, 30 instructors and 168 college students are asked to answer two different questionnaires for investigating their perceptions. After statistical analysis, the results demonstrate that instructors have very positive perceptions toward using e-learning as a teaching assisted tool. Furthermore, behavioral intention to use e-learning is influenced by perceived usefulness and self-efficacy. Regarding to learners’ attitudes, self-paced, teacher-led, and multimedia instruction are major factors to affect learners’ attitudes toward e-learning as an effective learning tool. Based on the findings, this research proposes guidelines for developing e-learning environments.