Integrating constructive feedback in personalised e-learning

When using e-learning material some students progress readily, others have difficulties. In a traditional classroom the teacher would identify those with difficulties and direct them to additional resources. This support is not easily available within e-learning. A new approach to providing constructive feedback is developed that will enable an e-learning system to identify areas of weakness and provide guidance on further study. The approach is based on the tagging of learning material with appropriate keywords that indicate the contents. Thus if a student performs poorly on an assessment on topic X, there is a need to suggest further study of X and participation in activities related to X such as forums. As well as supporting the learner this type of constructive feedback can also inform other stakeholders. For example a tutor can monitor the progress of a cohort; an instructional designer can monitor the quality of learning objects in facilitating the appropriate knowledge across many learners

Conformal oxide nanocoatings on electrodeposited 3D porous Ni films by atomic layer deposition

A versatile chemical synthesis procedure to obtain Al2O3 and Co2FeO4 nanolayers conformally coating a three-dimensional (3D) porous Ni film is presented. First, porous Ni is grown by hydrogen bubble template-assisted electrodeposition. Subsequently, Al2O3 and Co2FeO4 layers, with thickness ranging from 5 nm to 25 nm, are directly deposited onto the pore walls by atomic layer deposition, while maintaining the porous architecture and magnetic properties of the Ni scaffold. The crystal structure, thickness and distribution of elements within the composite coatings are investigated in detail. The resulting magnetic and wettability properties are assessed. Contact angle tests reveal that 3D porous Ni films become more hydrophilic after coating with Al2O3 or Co2FeO4. From a technological point of view, the obtained composite porous films could be appealing for applications like magnetically-actuated micro/nano-electromechanical systems (MEMS/NEMS) or bio-MEMS/NEMS, among others