2011 Fifth International Conference on Genetic and Evolutionary Computing
A Cross-Platform Mobile Learning System Using QT SDK Framework
Babatunde B. Akinkuolie, Chia-Feng Lin and Shyan-Ming Yuan Computer Science and Engineering, National Chiao Tung University Hsinchu 30010, Taiwan
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[email protected] Nowadays, QT SDK Framework has become a platform for mobile devices; as a result, this system allows learners to be interactive and entertaining while learning Chinese on a Nokia-based mobile device. In this paper, through the design and implementation of a mobile learning system for learning Chinese, the various features of the system are introduced such as a English-Chinese/ Chinese-English translation engine, a word search puzzle and multiple choice questions for vocabularies. This system will test the students’ skills by answering questions and using their intellectuality to solve common word and phrase problems. In addition to testing the students' learning skills in the Chinese language, the system allows them for faster translation of any given word regardless of the place and time. The system is implemented using QT SDK Framework thus making it a mobile and platform independent system. This paper goes though design and implementation as well as the experiments conducted. The system is built for the mobile environment. The second section describes the framework used to develop the system; the third section describes the system architecture. The fourth section discusses the results and the final section concludes the research and its future works.
Abstract— The development and acceptance pace of Mobile Learning Technologies are increasing rapidly as there are abundant applications for mobile learning technologies in education, from the ability to convey learning modules as well as facilitating learners to communicate and learn "on-the-go". Mobile Learning in Chinese has become to play a role in the attainment of Chinese proficiency; therefore, International Students face many issues related to the Chinese Language itself. This paper explains the development of a UI-based mobile learning system for learning Chinese as a second language. QT SDK Framework was used to develop this system that works on mobile phones. Ten Chinese Lessons were developed for this system. International Students at National Chiao Tung University tried out this system using their mobile phones for 5 weeks. Surveys were used to evaluate the usability and effectiveness of the system. Keywords; Mobile Learning, Chinese Language Learning.
I.
INTRODUCTION
With the progression of mobile technologies, the traditional classroom based learning has been complemented by other forms of teaching capable of getting in touch with a wide range of learners; therefore, mobile learning presents possible solutions that tackle the limitations of the traditional classroom based education. Many International Students travel to countries in which Chinese is spoken like Taiwan to increase their competence in Chinese. However, the adjustment into a Chinese-speaking environment and the language barrier is a hard task to learn as it may daunt learners to learn Chinese; hence, learning tactics that allow these learners to learn is needed; as a result, Mobile Learning is suited to satisfy this need. Many researches and projects have continued to use mobile learning in applying knowledge [1][2]. Furthermore, mobile phones has also been used for learning especially for Chinese Language Learning[3][4][12].Jo Colley and Geoff Stead[5] showed that learning materials is needed and that developing these innovative learning materials present a clear perspective on the learning goal. Currently, developing a good mobile learning system relies upon the creative use of the mobile environment; therefore, mobile devices have become more widespread in our everyday lives; thus, making these devices for learning more suitable. 978-0-7695-4449-6/11 $26.00 © 2011 IEEE DOI 10.1109/ICGEC.2011.47
II.
QT SDK FRAMEWORK FOR MOBILE DEVELOPMENT
QT SDK Framework is a cross-platform framework that is assigned to develop Symbian and Maemo platforms for mobile devices. Some of the characteristics of QT SDK Framework for Mobile Development include [6]: • • • •
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Simple to Install: QT SDK can be installed from packages which is why it is an easy setup but not a complicated one for mobile development. Completed Tool Chain: allow developers to find everything that is needed to get their applications fully tested and deployed them on mobile devices. Rapid Development: contains powerful and intuitive tools such as QT Designer and also on-device debugging used to accelerate through development. UIs are QT Quick: using QT designer or hand-code in JavaScript, using QT Quick allows developer to develop rich and interactive UIs faster.
•
III.
The Power of QT APIs: allows developers to do less with more with QT Mobility. • One code line, many devices: Using the QT SDK Framework allows developers to create applications for Symbian, Maemo and Meego devices. • Lightweight Simulator: allows applications to work on any QT enabled device quickly and easily. • Comprehensive on computer testing: Developers can create test data that includes dynamic data with scripts and simulate device states. • Remote Compiler: Developers can compile their QT applications to any platform from any computer. • Smart Installer: allows QT developers to download Qt and Open C/C++ components as the applications are installed. Furthermore, there are several tools that is needed to integrate Nokia QT SDK such as • QT Creator IDE • Symbian Development Environment • Maemo Development Environment • QT Simulator
SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE
Figure 2 shows the general architecture of the system. This is used for the data transfer between the mobile device and the system.
Figure 2: System Architecture The system is composed of the following modules: Translation Engine, Word Search Puzzle Engine and Multiple Choice Quiz Engine.
Figure 1: Nokia QT SDK Framework for Mobile Development QT SDK Framework can run on the following platforms • Windows (Windows 7, Vista, Server 2003, XP, 2000, NT4). • Macintosh (Mac OS X, 10.3 and 10.4). • Linux / X11 (Linux, Solaris, HP-UX, IRIX, AIX, many other Unix Variants). • Windows CE (Windows CE 5 and higher, Windows Mobile 5 and higher). • Embedded Linux. • Symbian. • Meego.
Figure 3: Main Menu of Application 1. Translation Engine - The objective of the translation engine is to translate any given word from English/Chinese as well as Chinese/English translation. Traditional Chinese is the official Language of Taiwan. The translation engine was implemented using the core source of "google translate" which is a machine translation service; therefore, wireless communication is required for it to be functional. In any
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scenario, the user can enter any word he or she wants to convert. The default setting for the translation mode is English to Chinese; therefore, a user can convert from an English word or phrase to Chinese character as well as from Chinese character to English Word.
Figure 5: Word Search Puzzle 3. Multiple Choice Quiz Engine- The Last component of the system is the multiple choice quiz engine. It is divided into two categories: English to Chinese Multiple Choice Quiz Engine and Chinese to English Multiple Choice Quiz Engine. a) English to Chinese Multiple Choice Quiz Engine When the user selects this mode from English to Chinese quiz to complete the questions, the user must select the type of mode he or she wants to answer. The two types of mode used in the format of the engine is either Easy or Difficult. When the user selects whatever mode he or she wants, the answering of the questions begin. There are 10 questions in each lesson inside the engine whereby English words are shown and the user must find the corresponding answers in Chinese characters which as shown as options that the user must complete. After the user completes the questions, a congratulatory message is shown signaling that the user completed the questions successfully. If the user does not complete the questions, it must be done over for successful completion. b) Chinese to English Multiple Choice Quiz EngineWhen the user selects this mode from Chinese to English quiz to complete the questions; the user must select the type of mode he or she wants to answer. The two types of mode used in the format of the engine is also either Easy or Difficult. When the user selects whatever mode he or she wants, the user starts to answer the following questions. There are 10 questions also in each lesson inside the engine whereby Chinese characters are shown and the user must find the corresponding answers in English words which are shown as options that the user must complete. After the user completes the questions, a congratulatory message is shown signaling that the user completed the questions successfully. If the user does not complete the questions, it must be done over for successful completion.
Figure 4: Translation Engine 2. Word Search Puzzle Engine- Word Search Puzzle Engine is another component of the system that is very interactive and entertaining as well. It consists of 3 categories: English to Chinese puzzle, Pinyin to Chinese Puzzle and Chinese to English Puzzle. a) English to Chinese Word Search Puzzle- an English word is given on top of the word search puzzle and the user must find the corresponding meaning inside the puzzle which consists of Chinese characters. After the user completes the puzzle, a congratulatory message is shown signaling that the user completed the puzzle successfully. If the user does not complete the puzzle, it must be done over for successful completion. b) Pinyin to Chinese Word Search Puzzle- Pinyin is the official system to write out Chinese characters into the Roman alphabets. In this scenario, a pinyin character is given on top of the word search puzzle and the user must find the corresponding meaning of the pinyin character inside the puzzle which consists of Chinese characters. After the user completes the puzzle, a congratulatory message is shown signaling that the user completed the puzzle successfully. If the user does not complete the puzzle, it must be done over for successful completion. c) Chinese to English Word Search Puzzle- In this scenario, a Chinese character is given on top of the puzzle and the user must find the corresponding meaning of the Chinese character inside the puzzle that consists of English words. Likewise, after the user completes the puzzle, a congratulatory message is shown signaling that the user completed the puzzle successfully. If the user does not complete the puzzle, it must be done over for successful completion.
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CSUQ
Average
Standard Deviation
Overall Satisfaction
3.001754386
0.683139428
System Usefulness
2.8
0.892554043
Information Quality
3.385714286
0.895916154
Interface Quality
2.844444444
0.763067598
Table 1: Usability Study Results The CSUQ grades were considered satisfying. Anything below 4 was set to be acceptable prior to the research. The participants which were the international students had a positive effect with learning Chinese on their mobile devices. The Overall Satisfaction of the system had an average of 3 which indicated that the students were satisfied in general about the system while System Usefulness registered an average of 2.8; as a result, it indicates that the students believed that the system was easy to use. Furthermore, Information Quality also had an average of 3.38 as indicated by the students who believed that the information content of the system was precise and clear. Lastly, Interface Quality registered an average of 2.84. This indicated that the students believed that the interface of the system was distinctly clear. Overall, System Usefulness and Interface Quality were the highest category from the usability test. In addition, there were numerous positive remarks on the Overall Satisfaction, System Usefulness, Information Quality and Interface Quality.
Figure 6: Multiple Choice Quiz Engine Learning interactively with the system, the user is able to effectively learn Chinese; furthermore, making it more entertaining and fun. This system used the content of the textbooks provided by the NCTU Chinese Center [13][14][15]16]. IV.
EXPERIMENT AND RESULTS
To attract the international students to participate in this research, a survey website was created and placed on the server; furthermore electronic mails were also sent to the students as well with a link to the survey website. The requirements for the participants were to accomplish all the components of the study which included: • Using the system for a total period of 5 weeks. • Answering the survey questions after trying out the system. A total of 10 females and 20 males’ international students were selected and participated in the experiment. Most of these students had either beginner or basic level of Chinese Proficiency. Furthermore, they filled out and answered the survey questions on the survey website after 5 weeks. The survey questions were used from CSUQ (Computer System Usability Questionnaire (Lewis, 1995)).CSUQ, developed by IBM, was designed to evaluate the usability of a computer system. It contains 19 questions, each being a statement that the user has to rate on a (1-7) scale ranging from "strongly disagree" to "strongly agree". The CSUQ were divided into categories of System Usefulness, Information Quality, Overall Satisfaction and Interface Quality. The results for overall satisfaction, system usefulness, information quality and interface quality are shown in Table 1 .It was noted that the Likert Scale for the survey is scored from 1 being the highest ranking to 7 as the lowest. For this section, the scores are reversed for better readability.
V.
CONCLUSION AND FUTURE WORK
The major findings of this research showed that Majority of the International Students at National Chiao Tung University who participated in the experiment showed positive stance towards mobile Chinese learning and are keen to learn Chinese using their mobile devices. This system provides International Students with effortless and resourceful access to translating any given word at any time; in addition, the different interactive learning games not only assist these International Students to learn well but also entertaining. International Students can learn and occupy themselves on the system anytime and anywhere. This system will persist to grow and the future work will include improving the content of the system by adding more word search puzzles and multiple choice questions, creating more assortments of interactive learning options for the system, continuous enhancement of the system to continuously suit the students’ needs and further experiments will be conducted for a long period of time.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENT This study was supported by the National Science Council, Taiwan, under grant No. NSC 99-2511-S-009-012MY3.
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