A persistent infrastructure for augmented field trips

This paper describes an approach to the provision of pervasive field trips where a persistent infrastructure is provided, upon which teachers can easily create novel pervasive experiences for children. The physical infrastructure is briefly described along with the underlying information infrastructure, which enables the tools for authoring the content and designing the orchestration of the experience to be placed in the hands of teachers. A literacy experience and initial trials of the system are discussed, conclusions drawn, and future directions outlined

Building dynamic WAP applications using UWE

The great advance of the communications and the importance gained by the mobile systems have increased the development of WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) applications, nevertheless at the present time do not exist methodologies specifically designed for the WAP applications development process. However, in the last years, several methodologies for the web applications development process have been proposed. One of them is UWE (UML-based Web Engineering) [1]. Although this methodology has specifically been developed for web applications, the similarity between web and WAP systems allows us to propose the use of it, to generate a design stage approach for WAP applications and then to create a specific extension of UWE to build WAP applications. In order to obtain this, we present a new UWE based model called WAP navigational model for the navigational design and presentational design steps, which we can use to design WAP systems improving the WAP applications development process.Eje: I - Workshop de Ingeniería de Software y Base de DatosRed de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI

Designing the interface between research, learning and teaching.

Abstract: This paper’s central argument is that teaching and research need to be reshaped so that they connect in a productive way. This will require actions at a whole range of levels, from the individual teacher to the national system and include the international communities of design scholars. To do this, we need to start at the level of the individual teacher and course team. This paper cites some examples of strategies that focus on what students do as learners and how teachers teach and design courses to enhance research-led teaching. The paper commences with an examination of the departmental context of (art and) design education. This is followed by an exploration of what is understood by research-led teaching and a further discussion of the dimensions of research-led teaching. It questions whether these dimensions are evident, and if so to what degree in design departments, programmes and courses. The discussion examines the features of research-led departments and asks if a department is not research-led in its approach to teaching, why it should consider changing strategies

Personalised trails and learner profiling within e-learning environments

This deliverable focuses on personalisation and personalised trails. We begin by introducing and defining the concepts of personalisation and personalised trails. Personalisation requires that a user profile be stored, and so we assess currently available standard profile schemas and discuss the requirements for a profile to support personalised learning. We then review techniques for providing personalisation and some systems that implement these techniques, and discuss some of the issues around evaluating personalisation systems. We look especially at the use of learning and cognitive styles to support personalised learning, and also consider personalisation in the field of mobile learning, which has a slightly different take on the subject, and in commercially available systems, where personalisation support is found to currently be only at quite a low level. We conclude with a summary of the lessons to be learned from our review of personalisation and personalised trails

Building dynamic WAP applications using UWE

The great advance of the communications and the importance gained by the mobile systems have increased the development of WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) applications, nevertheless at the present time do not exist methodologies specifically designed for the WAP applications development process. However, in the last years, several methodologies for the web applications development process have been proposed. One of them is UWE (UML-based Web Engineering) [1]. Although this methodology has specifically been developed for web applications, the similarity between web and WAP systems allows us to propose the use of it, to generate a design stage approach for WAP applications and then to create a specific extension of UWE to build WAP applications. In order to obtain this, we present a new UWE based model called WAP navigational model for the navigational design and presentational design steps, which we can use to design WAP systems improving the WAP applications development process.Eje: I - Workshop de Ingeniería de Software y Base de DatosRed de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI

Applying Recommender Systems and Adaptive Hypermedia for e-Learning Personalizatio

Learners learn differently because they are different -- and they grow more distinctive as they mature. Personalized learning occurs when e-learning systems make deliberate efforts to design educational experiences that fit the needs, goals, talents, and interests of their learners. Researchers had recently begun to investigate various techniques to help teachers improve e-learning systems. In this paper we present our design and implementation of an adaptive and intelligent web-based programming tutoring system -- Protus, which applies recommendation and adaptive hypermedia techniques. This system aims at automatically guiding the learner's activities and recommend relevant links and actions to him/her during the learning process. Experiments on real data sets show the suitability of using both recommendation and hypermedia techniques in order to suggest online learning activities to learners based on their preferences, knowledge and the opinions of the users with similar characteristics

Knowledge Cartography: Software tools and mapping techniques

Knowledge Cartography is the discipline of mapping intellectual landscapes.The focus of this book is on the process by which manually crafting interactive, hypertextual maps clarifies one’s own understanding, as well as communicating it.The authors see mapping software as a set of visual tools for reading and writing in a networked age. In an information ocean, the primary challenge is to find meaningful patterns around which we can weave plausible narratives. Maps of concepts, discussions and arguments make the connections between ideas tangible and disputable. With 17 chapters from the leading researchers and practitioners, the reader will find the current state–of-the-art in the field. Part 1 focuses on educational applications in schools and universities, before Part 2 turns to applications in professional communitie

Can Digital Drawing Tools Significantly Develop Children’s Artistic Ability and Creative Activity?

This study aims to investigate how the new digital art tools can significantly improve children‟s artistic ability and creative activity. This particular research tested 16 students aged 9-10 years old in art classes, with the intention of presenting a model for the development and measurement of technological creativity. It uses a modified TAM technology acceptance model to assess the usefulness of digital art tools. The children were provided with appropriate subjects and techniques to improve their performance with the tools, and the relationship between art, technology and creativity was explored. The results of the project show a general improvement in pupils‟ artistic ability and inventiveness through the development of their technological skills, as well as greater ability to express themselves visually