3rd National Seminar on “e-Learning & e-Learning Technologies”
November 5-6, 2009
Venue
UGC-Academic Staff College Auditorium JNT University Campus Kukatpally, Hyderabad
Organized by
Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC), Hyderabad
Jointly with Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU), Hyderabad
in association with Department of Information Technology Ministry of Communications & Information Technology Government of India
Moving towards e--Learning for all!
ELELTECH INDIA – 2009
National Seminar “e-Learning & e-Learning Technologies” ELELTECH INDIA 2009 (November 5-6, 2009) HYDERABAD
Programme Schedule Thursday November 5th 08:30 AM to 09:30 AM
Registration
09:30 AM to 10:30 AM
Inauguration
10:30 AM to 11:00 AM
11:00 AM to 11:45 AM
TEA BREAK
Keynote address: “NPTEL and the National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (NMEICT) as part of free and online open education and e-learning” Prof. Mangala Sunder Krishnan, IIT Madras
Technical Session I Content Development, Design, Delivery and Standards [11.45 AM to 01:15 PM]
11.45 AM to 12.15 PM
Invited Talk: “Content development for successful elearning environments” Prof. Sridhar Iyer and Prof. Sahana Murthy, IIT Bombay
12.15 PM to 12.45 PM
Invited Talk: “Web 2.0 Implications for e-learning content design and development” Dr. Madhuri Dubey, Cordys Software India Pvt Ltd
ELELTECH INDIA 2009
12.45 PM to 01.00 PM
Dynamic Content Adaptation to Mobile Devices Mr. Ramu Parupalli, Ms. Nava Jyothi, C-DAC, Hyderabad
01.00 PM to 01.15 PM
M-Learning Portal for Physically Handicapped Mr. M V Ramana Murthy, C-DAC, Bangalore
01:15 PM to 02:00 PM
LUNCH BREAK
Technical Session II Internet Pedagogy: Instructional Design, Assessment Methodologies, Personalized Learning and Peer to Peer Learning [02:00 PM to 03:50 PM] 02.00 PM to 02.30 PM
Invited Talk -
“Tools for Language Learning”
Prof. K Narayana Murty, University of Hyderabad
02.30 PM to 02.50 PM
Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning Ms. Geeta Bose, Kern Learning Solutions Pvt Ltd
02.50 PM to 03.10 PM
Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments Ms. Archana Rane, Mr. Akshay Kumar, Mr. Harmeet Saini and Dr. M Sasikumar, C-DAC, Mumbai
03.10 PM to 03.30 PM
E- Evaluation for Visually Challenged Students Ms. M. Dhanalakshmi and Mr. Y. Laxminarayana
03.30 PM to 03.50 PM
Interactive Learning Environments for Mathematics Mr. Akshay Kumar, Ms. Archana Rane and Dr. Sasikumar M, C-DAC Mumbai
03:50 PM to 04:00 PM ELELTECH INDIA 2009
TEA BREAK
Technical Session III Case studies of e-Learning implementations [04.00 PM to 05:30 PM]
04.00 PM to 04.30 PM
Invited Talk – implementations”
“Case
Studies
of
e-Learning
Mr. Alok Tiwari, Infosys Technologies 04.30 PM to 04.50 PM
Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools Ms. Jhumpa Ghosh Ray, Change Initiatives
04.50 PM to 05.10 PM
E-Learning and its Impact on Learning Mr. Sudipta S. Majumdar and Mr. Ramesh Chandra, Honeywell Technology Solutions, Bangalore
05.10 PM to 05.30 PM
Web Technologies for Teaching - A Practitioner's experience Mr. Ravindra Dastikop, SDM College of Engineering & Technology, Dharwad
05.30 PM to 06.00 PM
Talk over Skype by Prof M.S. Vijay Kumar, Senior Associate Dean & Director Office of Educational Innovation and Technology (OEIT), MIT, USA
06:00 PM to 07:00 PM
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Networking Time
07:00 PM to 08:00 PM
Cultural Programme
8:00 PM to 09:00 PM
DINNER
Friday November 6 09:00 AM to 09:45 AM
Keynote address Prof. Deepak B. Phatak, IIT Bombay
Technical Session IV ‘
e-Learning Tools, Quality Assurance and Standards [09.45 AM to 11:35 AM]
09.45 AM to 10.15 AM
Invited Talk – “Brihaspati-2 : open source e-learning system” Dr. Y N Singh, IIT Kanpur
10.15 AM to 10.35 AM
A 3-tier review model for e-learning modules Dr. Vinod Joshi and Dr. Uma M Somayajula, SKS MicroFinance, Hyderabad
10.35 AM to 10.55 AM
Learnability Testing of Online Courses Ms. Archana Narayan, Kern Learning Solutions Pvt Ltd
10.55 AM to 11.15 AM
Quality Metrics in E-education Ms. S. Sasmita Nayak, Biju Patnaik University of Technology, Mr. Alok Ranjan Sahoo, NM Institute of
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Technology and Dr. Engineering College
11.15 AM to 11.35 AM
Saroj
Kumar
Lenka,
Krupajal
e-Content Evaluation Framework – An approach and evaluation strategy Mr. Vikas Garg, Mr. Vikas Rangi, Mr. N. Satyanarayana and Dr. Sarat Chandra Babu, C-DAC Hyderabad
11.35 AM to 11.50 AM
TEA BREAK
Technical Session V ‘
FOSS & Accessible e-Learning [11.50 AM to 01:20 PM]
11.50 AM to 12.20 PM
Invited Talk – “Collaborative Objects in Distance Education (CODE)” Dr. Kamal Bijlani, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham
12.20 PM to 12.40 PM
Open Source Technologies Courseware in e-Learning
and
Open
Source
Ms. Nirupama Nayana Rout and Ms. Prathibha. B, C-DAC Chennai
12.40 PM to 01.00 PM
Self-Learning E-Learning Accessibility Model for the Disabled Ms. Annie Joyce Vullamparthi, C-DAC Bangalore
01.00 PM to 01.20 PM
Course Material Sharing System for Educational Institutes using Open Source and Free Softwares Mr. S. Saravanan and Dr. S. Nadaradjan, Pandit Jawaharalal Nehru College of Agriculture & Research Institute
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01:20 PM to 02:15 PM
LUNCH BREAK
Technical Session VI ‘
New Trends in e-Learning [02.15 PM to 03:25 PM]
Invited Talk:
02.15 PM to 02.45 PM
Prof. K. R. Srivathsan, Pro-Vice-Chancellor, IGNOU RFID Based Context Aware Ubiquitous Learning System
02.45 PM to 03.05 PM
Mr. M.Kumar, Ms. Nava Jyothi, C-DAC Hyderabad Ubiquitous learning using mobile devices- An insight
03.05 PM to 03.25 PM
Ms. Lakshmi Kalyani and Mr. V.K. Sharma, C-DAC Noida
03.25 PM to 03.45 PM
TEA BREAK
03.45 PM to 04.15 PM
Industry Track
04.15 PM to 05.00 PM
Panel Discussion: Moving towards e-Learning for all: Preparedness of India
Chairman:
Prof. U.B Desai, Director, IIT Hyderabad
Members:
Prof Kushal Sen, IIT Delhi Dr. S Birendra Singh, Executive Director, DOEACC, Delhi Mr. D Selvan, Wipro Dr. Sandhya, NASSCOM Prof. M. Srinivasa Rao, School of IT, JNTU Hyderabad
05.00 PM to 05.30 PM
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Ratiocination
About C-DAC Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) is a premier Research and Development organization engaged in the design, development and deployment of cutting edge products and solutions in the area of electronics and Information Technology. As a Scientific Society under the Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Government of India, C-DAC is also spearheading the national initiatives in IT to meet the technological needs of the country. Right from its inception (March 1988) C-DAC has grown from strength to strength, and leveraged its core expertise to develop its capabilities in a multitude of technology domains. The technologies that C-DAC deals with are High Performance Computing (HPC), Natural Language Processing (NLP), Artificial Intelligence (AI), e-learning, Multilingual Multimedia Computing, Strategic and Power Electronics, Embedded Systems, Ubiquitous Computing, Control and Virtual Instrumentation, Agro Electronics, Open Source Software, Medical Informatics, Geomatic, Cyber security, Real Time Systems and Software, Data Warehousing, Data Mining, Digital/ Broadband Wireless Networks, Scientific Modeling & Visualization. Widely acclaimed and recognized for its indigenously developed PARAM series of supercomputers, CDAC’s High Performance Computing and Communication (HPCC) Technologies cover Hardware Technologies Development, System Software Development and Applications Development Programme. The PARAM Padma and PARAM 10000 housed at C-DAC’s Terascale Supercomputing Facility (CTSF), Knowledge Park, Bangalore and the National PARAM Supercomputing Facility (NPSF), Pune, respectively are actively engaged in research in various scientific domains of Computational Structural Mechanics, Computational Atmospheric Sciences, Computational Fluid Dynamics, Seismic Data Processing, Bio informatics, Quantum Chemistry, Ab-initio Molecular Dynamics, Imaging, Financial Modeling and Decision Support Systems.
About C-DAC Hyderabad C-DAC Hyderabad, established in the year 1999, is today recognized as one of the key resource centers for state-of-the-art IT solutions and training using latest technologies and IT infrastructure. As a Research & Development organization, it has made its presence felt through various innovative projects touching diverse fields of economic and human advancement. The e-Sikshak tool, a multilingual e-Learning environment that spawns a virtual classroom paradigm among users, asserts C-DAC Hyderabad’s prominence in the field of e-Learning. The centre also possesses expertise in SCORM standards for content development, which has been put to practical usage with CCSPM, CDAC Hyderabad’s flagship course on software process management and course on cyber security, apart from courses related to computer science domain there are other multilingual courses freely available namely course on “Right to Information ACT”(RTI) in Hindi, agriculture related courses in Hindi and Telugu, and “Basics of computer” in Telugu. Other areas of interest include e-Security, Embedded Systems Design, Ubiquitous Computing, Enterprise Applications, Data Mining, VLSI Design, Grid Computing etc. Another unique achievement is the Concept Lab developed by C-DAC Hyderabad with an objective to develop, test, train and demonstrate various network security tools and technologies. Here users can simulate their own network environment to study the security problems and the effects of various security solutions. The C-DAC family acknowledges High Performance Grid Computing as a futuristic mission program and C-DAC Hyderabad is fortunate enough to be identified as one of the nodes in a nationwide resource-sharing grid. The three-pronged objective of Knowledge Creation through R&D and learning, Knowledge Application through projects, products and services and Knowledge Dissemination through training provides CDAC Hyderabad with a well-defined path towards technological excellence. The Value Proposition upheld by C-DAC Hyderabad, which is to provide Low Cost, Innovative and Secure solutions for multiple applications using multiple technologies, also vindicates its commitment towards the society.
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Foreword Rajan T Joseph Director General, C-DAC
ELELTECH INDIA 2009, a National seminar on “e-Learning and e-Learning Technologies” is a flagship seminar being organized by C-DAC, Hyderabad for the third time. Two National seminars ELELTECH INDIA 2001 during 7-8, August 2001 and ELELTECH INDIA 2005 during 8-9, August 2005 were organized by Dr. Sarat and his team earlier. C-DAC, Hyderabad has been working in the area of e-Learning and contributing by developing tools, content and also offering courses in e-Learning. It is very thoughtful of C-DAC, Hyderabad, to continuously, organize this National Seminar this year. It is heartening to see the synergy this seminar is bringing by joining hands with the Academic institute - JNT University, which is strengthening this event. I am sure that such a mega event would not have been possible without the active association of Department of IT, Ministry of Communications & IT, Government of India. I am happy to see that the sessions are well structured into very useful themes like Content development, design, delivery and standards; Internet pedagogy: Instructional design, Assessment methodologies, Personalized learning and Peer to Peer learning; Case studies of eLearning implementations; e-Learning tools, quality assurance and standards; FOSS and Accessible e-Learning; New Trends in e-Learning. I consider that while we worked on these sessions we made it a point to bring Indian context as focus and at the same time looking into the futuristic technologies and how it would help India to take benefit of this new paradigm of learning. I am very sure that with the eminent personalities in this field participating through key-note, invited talks, paper presentations and panel discussions, the participants would have an unique opportunity of first hand information on the e-Learning experiences. I would like to thank e-Learning Division of Department of IT, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Government of India for graciously supporting this event. I congratulate my team at Hyderabad for their efforts and also thank the organizations who joined us in this endeavor. I wish the seminar a grand success.
(Rajan T. Joseph)
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Preface N. Sarat Chandra Babu Director, C-DAC Hyderabad
“You can’t teach people everything they need to know. The best you can do is position them where they can find, what they need to know, when they need to know it.” - Seymour Papert The advancement of IT sector has made education accessible and affordable to millions of people. Today internet and education are totally inseparable. The explosive growth of internet penetration in India has opened the door of “anytime anywhere” learning. Online learning or e-learning is no more a new paradigm of learning. It is all the more accepted way of learning in many ways and is all about effective or enhanced learning. Cost effectiveness, flexibility of learning anytime anywhere, uniform delivery to all users reducing chances of misinterpretations, reachability, affordability, user friendliness, just-in-time learning, increased retention, promotion of team learning and collaboration, and easier access to global community, has given e-Learning a competitive edge over the traditional method of learning. Well designed Multimedia/flash based animations in e-Learning help the students to easily grasp the concepts and their inquisitiveness can be better satisfied by having virtual labs for conducting experiments, without fear of wasting resources. The high speed fabric availability and grid learning will make the remote labs a reality. Teachers in the schools now can easily use technology to support classroom instructions. Explosive penetration of mobile phones can be taken for advantage in the field of education. Integration of mobile devices and use of RFID, Bluetooth, WI-Fi, 3G technologies, in providing educational services will lead to Ubiquitous Learning. e-Content and infrastructure are also very much essential for e-Learning to be a successful or effective tool. At this juncture, Government of India had come up with various programs like NPTEL (for content), NKN (for infrastructure) and NMICTE (for ecosystem). Keeping in view the growth of higher educational institutes and the need of quality faculty, we need to think of eLearning solutions such as virtual class rooms which can drive the reach of quality faculty to the nook and corner of the country. We realize the time has come to contribute towards the growth of e-Learning and thereby influence positively towards the needs of education and training specific to our country. Keeping this in view, C-DAC and JNTU Hyderabad has come together to organize a National Seminar on e-Learning and e-Learning technologies (ELETECH INDIA 2009) during November 5-6, 2009 in association with E-Learning Division, Department of Information technology, Ministry of Communications and IT at UGC-Academic Staff College auditorium, JNTUH campus. The objective of this seminar is to provide a common platform for sharing experiences, exchanging examples of good practice and taking stock of the added value of using ICT in education and training. The technical programme of the Seminar consists of two Keynote addresses, six technical sessions and panel discussions. A brief account of the sessions and their importance is given below:
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Session I: Internet Pedagogy: Instructional Design, Assessment Methodologies, Personalized Learning and Peer to Peer Learning Instructional design shall provide a systematic process of developing instructional systems while Personal Learning Environments shall help learners to take control of and manage their own learning and the use of Peer-to-Peer technologies shall allow connecting a range of resources and systems within a personally-managed space. Session II: Content Development, Design, Delivery and Standards Content is one of the most important aspects of e-Learning, since the content’s Development, Design, Delivery and Standardization creates a comprehensive and engaging learning experience. Conformance to global e-Learning standards, Suitability of integration with other vendors’ solutions, Enhanced scalability and usability of content, Ability to serve diverse learners needs, increased reach, flexibility, and quality of learning, are certain advantages of efficient content development. Session III: Case studies of e-Learning implementations Case study showcases how enormous e-Learning initiatives play a pivotal role in a major educational/organizational overhaul. This session presents case studies which are examples of effective e-learning, teaching and assessment practices. Each case study provides an outline of first-hand information on the experiences of web technologies and the impact of e-learning and embedding it in various sectors. Session IV: e-Learning Tools, Quality Assurance and Standards Educators have long recognized the enormous potential benefits of the Internet as a teaching and learning tool. Even the quality of e-learning tools and content is an important factor to provide quality education. The session majorly focuses on importance of e-Content evaluation for eLearning environments, Quality measures, quality perspective of content in Indian context, standards and its importance in e-Learning. Session V: FOSS and Accessible e-Learning Open source technologies will play important role to spread e-Learning to large target beneficieries.This session focuses on importance of open source software and courseware as well as accessibility model for disabled peoples through self learning, mobile learning portals and sharing systems between educational institutes. Session VI: New Trends in e-Learning The learning solutions and services are currently getting integrated into mobile technologies. eLearning is expected to extend itself with value addition of mobile learning and ubiquitous learning. By recognizing that e-learning truly is a methodology, one can experience the greatest benefits that e-learning has to offer in the future through the various technological trends that are occurring in this field under this section. ends with a Panel discussion on “Moving towards e-learning for all: Preparedness of India” to arrive at recommendations on making e-learning an affordable and useful solution in Indian content. As organizers we do hope that the deliberations during this seminar through papers, keynotes and invited talks would provide a unique opportunity to gain insight into this today and future’s learning paradigm.
(N Sarat Chandra Babu)
ELELTECH INDIA 2009
Acknowledgement This is a great moment of joy to organize this event which we all were eagerly waiting for. The monumental task that has been carried out for organizing this Seminar would have been impossible without the proactive help from many other people we interacted with. After the grand success of ELELTECH INDIA 2001 and 2005, C-DAC Hyderabad once again thank Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology for giving a chance to organize National Seminar ELELTECH INDIA 2009. We would also take this opportunity to thank Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU), Hyderabad, for joining us in making this event a grand success. First of all we would like to thank Shri. Rajan T. Joseph, Director General, C-DAC for inspiring and motivating us in striving towards C-DAC’s vision and objectives, encouraging us to contribute to the futuristic technologies. This seminar is one such activity where his personal attention to the theme and his own interest in e-Learning was of abundant help. We thank Shri. N. Ravi Shankar, IAS, Joint Secretary, Department of information Technology, Government of India, who is leading e-Learning activities at National level, for his continuous support and motivation in all e-Learning activities, including this National Seminar and also for his timely inputs in the capacity of Chairman, Advisory Committee of ELELTECH INDIA 2009. We express our gratitude towards Dr. D. N. Reddy, Vice Chancellor, JNTU, as our esteemed host and well wisher. We are very grateful to all the members of the Advisory Committee for their invaluable suggestions and encouragement at each stage. We were very much confident about the Seminar as the members of the Advisory Committee has taken the Seminar close to their hearts and timely reviewed our efforts in this regard. We are very much thankful to the Technical Committee because they were the people who walked that extra distance with us. Their presence and help in the reviews and finalization of the technical program made the rest of the tasks easier. At this point of time we express our sincere thanks to the paper reviewers for their efforts in finalizing the technical papers of various sessions of the Seminar. The technical sessions of Seminar is enlightened by the eminent Invited Speakers, who have wide experience in the areas of academics, industry, R&D and Government. Their contributions to this National Seminar in sharing their invaluable views and experiences will be remembered with reverence. The paper presenters who are participating in this Seminar from across India have added their invaluable experiences to the success of this Seminar. The enthusiasm shown by the scientists, technologists, industry and government shows the amount of interest generated and points to a bright future of e-Learning in India and abroad. We express our sincere thanks to BSNL, Media Pro, Media Lab Asia, DOEACC for sponsoring this event. This Seminar was the teamwork planned and carried out under the able guidance of Dr.N.Sarat Chandra Babu, Director, C-DAC Hyderabad. The collective effort of the members of C-DAC Hyderabad and their dedication is reflected in the success of the Seminar. This makes us confident in carrying out more challenging responsibilities in future as a successful team. We remember the days when all the members burned their midnight oil to add another feather to its cap. Special thanks from us goes to all the colleagues of C-DAC, Hyderabad who had been contributing directly and indirectly for making this Seminar a grand success.
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Advisory Committee Chairman: Mr. N Ravi Shanker
Department of IT, Govt. of India
Members: Dr. B G Sidharth
BM Birla Science Centre
Prof. Beena Shah
AIU
Prof. D B Pathak
IIT Bombay
Prof. K R Srivathsan
IGNOU
Dr. Mangal Sunder Krishnan
IIT, Madras
Prof. M Chandrasekhar
ASCI
Dr. N.V. Ramana Rao
JNTU
Dr. N Shridhar
Sankhya Infotech Ltd
Dr.P.K.Sinha
C-DAC, Pune
Dr. S Birendra Singh
DoEACC
Ms. Swati Mujumdar
SCDL
Technical Committee Chairman: Mr. S. Ramakrishnan
Former DG, C-DAC
Members: Mr. A K Arora
DIT, Govt. of India
Dr. Ankush Mittal
IIT, Roorkee
Shri Anupam Pahuja
SumTotal Systems
Ms. C. V. Syamala
Quality Analyst
Prof. Jayanthi Sivaswamy
IIIT
Dr. J S R Subramanyam
DTE
Prof. K Narayana Murthy
UoH
Dr. Madhuri Dubey
Cordys Software Ltd
Prof. M. Sreenivasa Rao
JNTU
Dr. M U Deshpande
Raisoni Group of Inst.
Dr. N.Sarat Chandra Babu
C-DAC
Dr. Sasi kumar
C-DAC, Mumbai
Prof. Sridhar Iyer
IIT, Bombay
Dr. Y N Singh
IIT, Kanpur
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Organizing Committee Chairman: Dr. N. Sarat Chandra Babu
C-DAC
Members: Prof. G Vijayakumari
JNTUH
Mr. N Satyanarayana
C-DAC
Exhibition & Promotion Committee Members: Mr. M Jagadish Babu
C-DAC
Mr. N Srinivasa Rao
C-DAC
Mr. Syed Fiaz Ahmed
C-DAC
Mr. Vikas Garg
C-DAC
Seminar Management System, Publication and Proceedings Committee Members: Mr. Sandesh Jain
C-DAC
Mr. Vivek Bandarkar
C-DAC
Ms. Latika S
C-DAC
Mr. Vikas Rangi
C-DAC
Mr. P J Pramod
C-DAC
Mr. V S M J Ramaraju
C-DAC
Eleltech 2009 Secretariat Members: Mr. M V N Rao
C-DAC
Mr. V V B Sudhakar
C-DAC
Ms. J Sailaja
C-DAC
Ms. P Priya
C-DAC
ELELTECH INDIA 2009
Contents Keynote Address Mangala Sunder Krishnan NPTEL and the National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (NMEICT) as part of free and online open education and e-learning
1
Session I: Content Development, Design, Delivery and Standards Invited Talk-1 Sridhar Iyer and Sahana Murthy Content development for successful e-learning environments
3
Invited Talk-2 Madhuri Dubey Web 2.0-Implications for e-learning content design and development
5
Papers Ramu Parupalli, Nava Jyothi Dynamic Content Adaptation to Mobile Devices
7
M V Ramana Murthy M-Learning Portal for Physically Handicapped
12
Session II: Internet Pedagogy - Instructional Design, Assessment Methodologies, Personalized Learning and Peer to Peer Learning Invited Talk K Narayana Murty Tools for Language Learning
18
Papers Geeta Bose Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning
22
Archana Rane, Akshay Kumar, Harmeet Saini and M Sasikumar Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments
31
M.Dhanalakshmi and Y.Laxminarayana E- Evaluation for Visually Challenged Students
40
Akshay Kumar, Archana Rane, Sasikumar M Interactive Learning Environments for Mathematics
45
Session III: Case studies of e-Learning implementations Invited Talk Alok Tiwari Case Studies of e-Learning implementations
52
Papers Jhumpa Ghosh Ray Digital Dreams for All: Embedding elearning in Rural Schools
53
Sudipta S. Majumdar and Ramesh Chandra E-Learning and its Impact on Learning
64
Ravindra Dastikop Web Technologies for Teaching - A Practitioner's experience
75
Keynote Address Deepak B. Phatak
80
Session IV: e-Learning Tools, Quality Assurance and Standards Invited Talk Y N Singh Brihaspati-2: open source e-learning system
82
Papers Vinod Joshi and Uma M Somayajula 3-tier review model for e-learning modules
84
Archana Narayan Learnability Testing of Online Courses
89
Sasmita Nayak, Saroj Kumar Lenka, Alok Ranjan Sahoo Quality Metrics in E-education
98
Vikas Garg, Vikas Rangi, N. Satyanarayana and Sarat Chandra Babu e-Content Evaluation Framework – An approach and evaluation strategy
105
Session V: FOSS & Accessible e-Learning Invited Talk Kamal Bijlani Collaborative Objects in Distance Education (CODE)
111
Papers Nirupama Nayana Rout and Prathibha. B Open Source Technologies and Open Source Courseware in e-Learning
113
Annie Joyce Vullamparthi Self-Learning E-Learning Accessibility Model for the Disabled
120
S. Saravanan and S. Nadaradjan Course Material Sharing System for Educational Institutes using Open Source and Free Softwares
131
Session VI: New Trends in e-Learning Invited Talk K. R. Srivathsan
136
Papers M.Kumar, Nava Jyothi RFID Based Context Aware Ubiquitous Learning System
138
Lakshmi Kalyani and V.K.Sharma Ubiquitous learning using mobile devices- An insight
143
Agenda for Panel Discussion Moving towards e-Learning for all: Preparedness of India
148
NPTEL and the NMEICT as part of free and online open education and e-learning
NPTEL and the National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (NMEICT) as part of free and online open education and e-learning
Dr. Mangala Sunder Krishnan IIT Chennai Dr. Mangala Sunder Krishnan was born on October 2, 1956 in Tirunelveli District, Tamil Nadu, India and received his formal education in Tamil Nadu before obtaining his Ph. D. from McGill University, Montreal, Canada in 1988 in Theoretical Chemistry. He had subsequently spent several years as a post doctoral fellow in the Universities of British Columbia, Montreal and Queens at Kingston, Canada before returning to India. He joined the Department of Chemistry, IIT Madras as an Assistant Professor in 1996 and became Associate Professor and later as Professor in the year 2004 and 2006 respectively. He has visited McGill University as a guest faculty for several years during summers of 1998-2002. He initiated the Web courses development programme in IIT Madras in the year 2001 using WebCT and later designed and developed the Web Studio which now serves the entire Institute as its web support team and the project entitled the National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL Project) for all of India. He has been nominated as the National Web courses Coordinator for the NPTEL project carried out jointly by seven IITs and IISC Bangalore and funded by the ELELTECH INDIA 2009
Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India since 2003. He is also an advisor to the E-Learning Programme Committee of the Ministry of Information Technology, Govt. of India. He is actively involved in implementing the Open Learning Initiative of Carnegie Mellon University in IIT Madras with development of several Chemistry courses and has developed hundreds of visuals and two and three dimensional animations for teaching physical chemistry in IIT Madras. He is one of the National coordinators for implementing country-wide classroom project for mentor-mentored IITs under the National Knowledge Network programme and a member of the programme Advisory group on E-learning, National Agricultural Innovation Programme (Component 1) under the Indian Council of Agricultural Research funded by the World Bank. He has guided more than a dozen M. Sc. Students in Chemistry for their research projects and has also supervised three Ph. D graduands in Theoretical Chemistry. There are four more Ph. D Scholars currently working in his group on several frontier areas in theoretical Chemistry. More details about his research, publications in journals and International conferences and lectures delivered nationally and internationally, teaching and technology initiatives can be obtained from the website http://chem.iitm.ac.in/professordetails/pr ofmangalsunder/index.htm or, by searching under his name in Google.
1
NPTEL and the NMEICT as part of free and online open education and e-learning
Abstract: The project NPTEL is an initiative of several Indian Institutes of Technology and Indian Institute of science funded by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD). It has entered its current phase (20072012) after an initial period of four years when a large number of course contents were created. Based on inputs received by its founders and based on many other valuable inputs on e-learning, open education, tools and technology development, quality of e-learning and research on pedagogical methods, the National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology has been launched this year by the MHRD. It has opened up an enormous possibility for quality improvement in higher education in India in a short period of time. However, the task has only begun and best practices of online education and teaching/learning processes have to be continuously evolved and monitored. In this presentation some of the details of the NPTEL project (second and third phases) and the NMEICT will be provided and roadmaps for the future will be outlined. The similarities and differences between these two initiatives together and several open content creation programmes launched throughout the world will be highlighted.
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2
Content development for successful e-learning environments
Content development learning environments
for
successful
e-
Abstract:
Sridhar Iyer IIT Bombay Prof. Sridhar Iyer is presently an Associate Professor in the Dept of Computer Science & Engg at IIT Bombay. Prior to this, he has been a faculty member in the Dept of Computer Science & Engg at IIT Guwahati. His research interests include: eLearning technologies, networking protocols and multimedia tools for distance education, wireless networking and applications, and some areas in program/protocol verification. More information is available from: www.cse.iitb.ac.in/~sri
We begin with a brief overview of different aspects of e-learning environments, such as, learning management systems, content management systems, customized and adaptable learning, and learning object repositories. We then analyze what makes certain e-learning content successful while others are not. We have identified three necessary (but not sufficient) conditions under which e-learning content is known to successful. The content must be (i) based on sound pedagogy, (ii) constructed using good design principles, and (iii) effort must be made for its widespread dissemination and adaptation.
IIT Bombay
We also highlight some conditions under which an e-learning environment is not specifically useful or meaningful. For example, when the content consists mostly of text-based webpages, it can be easily replaced by a book. At the other extreme, e-learning content that contains visually interesting but unnecessary or extraneous material can distract the user. Another common pitfall is to design content with low user interactivity.
Prof. Sahana Murthy is an Assistant Professor at the Centre for Distance Engineering Education Program (CDEEP), at IIT Bombay. Prior to this, she has done post-doctoral work at MIT and Rutgers University in the field of physics education research. She received her PhD degree in physics from Rutgers University, M.Sc in physics from IIT Bombay and B.Sc in physics from University of Mumbai. As part of her research, she studies: pedagogical aspects of ICT in education, teaching and learning of science/engineering process skills, and evaluating the effectiveness of educational programs.
To illustrate the above points we use Project OSCAR (Open-Source Courseware Animations Repository) as a case study. We describe how the animations and supporting activities are based on established pedagogical principles such as constructivism, interactive engagement and the value of multiple representations. The animations and simulations encourage meaningful exploration of the concept. The animations are interactive. They engage students by allowing them to control the parameters so that students can observe the effects of varying the parameters and construct their
Sahana Murthy
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Content development for successful e-learning environments
own understanding of the concept. A series of animations in OSCAR, called “Fun With Science” represents complex processes such as working of a DC Motor in multiple ways: an animation of the process, a stepby-step visual guide to making a toy motor and a video of the making and working of the motor. Project OSCAR animations have been designed keeping in mind principles such as: a) modularity – the content has been presented in segments of length that a typical user can pay attention to, instead of a long continuous unit, b) coherence -users’ attention is focused on the main concept by eliminating irrelevant content and c) consistency -- a unified visual theme in an animation, and across different animations helps users make correct interpretations of the material. For example, the choice of color helps users differentiate information types; user controls are placed in a separate distinct area than the visual animated area. To encourage adoption and increase accessibility, OSCAR uses the power of Open Source. There is a model wherein students, teachers, content experts and programmers have an opportunity to participate in creating new animations. The animations and the source code are then released under a Creative Commons license.
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Web 2.0 – Implications for e-Learning content design and development
Web 2.0 – Implications for e-Learning content design and development Abstract:
Madhuri Dubey Cordys Software India Ltd, Hyderabad Madhuri Dubey, Ph.D, is associated with Cordys Software India Ltd as Senior Consultant – e-learning. She has wideranging experience in various aspects of eLearning design, development and delivery. She is interested in exploring Internet as a medium for innovative and cost-effective ways of knowledge sharing for corporate training and academic e-learning.
The intriguing question is here again: do we decide on what technology to use depending on the type of learning content and learning goals or do we first select the technology and then think about the learning content. Which comes first – technology or content? Most of us may agree that it is the content that helps us choose the technology. We are also aware that Instructional Design plays an important role in ‘preparing’ technology to deliver the content. E-Learning has mostly followed the approach where we follow a systematic process of designing and developing the content and administering the courses to learners through standard environments like LMS and learning portals. Today, we are faced with new challenges as the Web is turning out to be a fascinating medium for sharing information and knowledge for learning and performance improvement. This also necessitates a fresh look at the technologycontent equation. The Web is fast evolving as a community platform with several collaborative and networking features. This has opened up exciting opportunities for facilitating knowledge and skills among different learner communities, apparently breaking the hierarchical relationship between subject experts and learners. Web 2.0 signifies the power of technology in fostering social aspects of learning that include collaborative course authoring, virtual classroom, content sharing and editing and so on. Tools like blogs, wikis, video chat and discussion forums are being leveraged to solicit active participation through interaction and reflection while sharing knowledge. In context of India, we are at different levels of adoption when it comes to e-learning. E-learning is
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Web 2.0 – Implications for e-Learning content design and development
envisaged as a viable solution for supplementing conventional learning, promoting self-study and providing blended learning. What is the scope of Web 2.0 in further improving the e-learning experience, especially in the context of India? Web 2.0 technologies can enhance the richness of learning experience through simple and ubiquitous tools. Google, YouTube, Face book, Twitter have radically changed the way we work with learning content. These tools offer easy, simple and convenient ways of developing and sharing learning content that can be accessed from various mobile devices too. While the face of learning is changing phenomenally, there are some key issues that get raised while we discuss learning in Web 2.0 way. These issues pertain to ascertaining quality and authenticity of content, learning from an unstructured context, role of subject experts and instructional designers, learning management tools and so on. In this presentation I shall explore the following points with the help of examples: • The transition from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0 and its impact on e-Learning •
Preparing the learners to advantage of Web 2.0 features
•
Role of teachers and trainers in maintaining content quality and standards
•
The empowering potential of Web 2.0
take
Dealing with new and evolving technology like Web 3.0
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Dynamic Content Adaptation to Mobile Devices
Dynamic Devices
Content
Adaptation
to
Mobile
Abstract:
Ramu Parupalli C-DAC Hyderabad Mr.Ramu Parupalli graduated in Computer Science Engineering from Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Hyderabad, India in 2006. He is currently working with Ubiquitous Computing Resource Research Center, Centre for Development of Advanced Computing, Hyderabad, Government of India. He is actively involved in Ubiquitous Learning, Personalized Learning projects. His areas of interest include scripting languages, web technologies, e-Learning and ubiquitous computing.
Nowadays, multiple devices with different characteristics can access networks. Some of these characteristics such as low processing power and memory capacity restrict the access to multimedia content. Therefore, t h e information content has to be tailored into different kinds of presentation depending on the types of computing devices. This leads to the need for multisource authoring - the creation of separate presentations for each device type or, at least, for each class of devices. Multi-source authoring is not a costefficient and feasible solution, especially for mobile services consisting of numerous pages. New software development models t h a t are a b l e t o adapt according to the c l i e n t d e v i c e context, have to be exploited, so that t h e developer ca n author once and present d a t a to any device. In this paper, s o m e of the open source content a da pta ti o n technologies are presented for mobile devices.
Index Terms—Mobile content, UAProf, Adaptation, WURFL.
CC/PP,
I. INTRODUCTION
Nava Jyothi K C-DAC Hyderabad Mrs. Nava Jyothi K is currently working in CDAC, Hyderabad. Her research interests include Grid Computing, High Performance Computing and Ubiquitous Learning. Her work in these areas has been published in national and International conferences. She is actively involved in projects such as Ubiquitous Learning and Collaborative Learning.
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THE World Wide Web has changed the way of sharing information. In the beginning of Internet era, content would be primarily viewed on desktop computers with the support of HyperText Markup Language. In the mean time, the creators of browsers found ways to use it to their advantage and to increase their market, which introduced new features and exercised control over the information presentation rendered slightly. The problem in differences in capabilities of computers can avoided by adjusting the web pages with the help of appropriate client-side scripts. With the advent of Mobile era, the current trend is to
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Dynamic Content Adaptation to Mobile Devices
access Web content and applications anytime, anywhere and on any device. Different devices, such as PDAs, mobile phones, tablets, and others, are also connected to the World Wide Web, being able to access not only web pages, but also multimedia content. Portable d ev i c es h a v e d i s t i n c t c a p a b i l i t i e s co mpa red w i th desktop computers. In the case of the video transmission, besides the concern with bandwidth needs, there is a problem while considering different device’s characteristics, such as display: a personal computer has resolution and screen format different from PDAs. In this way, some devices with restricted capabilities cannot access the multimedia content in a appro- priate manner. So it is no longer possible to deliver the same or slightly modified content to all devices. This divergence increases the difficulty of presenting friendly contents for all kinds of devices universally. Unfortunately, most web contents are designed for desktop PCs only. The default settings and stylesheets, such as image size, font size, and layout structure, are not suitable to present on portable devices. As a result, need for a technique to compose and deliver adaptive content from any platform in any format to any device through any network at anytime and anywhere. To achieve this we need to find out the context i.e. device details of the user and provides content adaptation based on such context. Content adaptation is a technique to provide the most suitable content presentation according to device. We can get the device context by CC/PP specification, developed by the W3C. The CC/PP offers an RDF based way to describe devices capabilities. However, CC/PP was not designed to describe contextual information, leading it inadequate in context-aware devices and users representations.
II. CONTENT ADAPTATION AND NEGOTIATION Adaptation means a process of selection, generation or modification of content (text, images, audio and video) to ELELTECH INDIA 2009
suit to the user’s computing environment and usage context. It may be applied to transformations within media types such as reducing image size or resolution. For e.g. Let’s imagine a normal web page with different media types. It is possible to see the original web page on accessing from a PC. When accessing the same with a mobile phone the text is summarized to tone paragraph, the image is rescaled and compressed. Adaptation can take place at the clientend, at the server or in an intermediate proxy between these two [1]. In the clientbased adaptation, the client device performs the required transcoding. For e.g. Opera Software uses proprietary client side adaptation technology to reformats web sites according to need. An extra effort of using another technology by the end-users is needed. In the server-based approach, multiple variants of the same content are stored on the server and selected to match the client device. Therefore, delivering already adapted content reduces transmission times. According to this approach, there is need to create the content that should fit to all mobile phones, but this have a limitation on the new mobile phones that come into market rapidly. In the proxy based approach, a proxy server analyzes and transcodes the content on the fly, before sending the result to the client. But this approach requires an additional server. A novel technology is needed to adapt the content to any type of mobile phone with out any extra effort on content provider or enduser.
III. CONTENT ADAPTATION TECHNIQUES A range of technologies are emerging in an effort to solve problems related to delivering content such as content negotiation, CC/PP (Composite Capacities/Preferences Profiles)[8], WURFL (Wireless Universal Resource FiLe) [2] etc. A. Content negotiation
of
Content negotiation means an exchange information (negotiation metadata),
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Dynamic Content Adaptation to Mobile Devices
which leads to selection of the appropriate representation (variant) when transferring a data resource. The protocol used on the web, Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), includes a content negotiation mechanism where the browser indicates what type of information it can accept, and the server decides what type of information to return based on the information received from the browser. In content negotiation, HTTP request headers enable the description of browser capabilities and simple user. Although HTTP content negotiation is a nice feature, it has been criticized because it was designed for browser descriptions and it lack means for context and device descriptions. Information in HTTP headers is limited and hard to extend. Moreover, XML syntax for information would be nice to achieve better interoperability. In the early days of Internet era, besides accept headers, clients also send a UserAgent header to identify themselves to perform content adaptation. This header contains information about browser and the operating system of the requesting device. It became tricky to rely on these headers as there are many number of browsers existing today. Few attempts have been made to provide the device capabilities, but couldn’t become standardized. In order for a web server or web-based application to provide optimized content to different clients it requires a description of the capabilities of the client known as the delivery context. There are two compatible standards that are created based on the Resource Description Framework (RDF) for describing delivery context: Composite Capabilities / Preferences Profile (CC/PP)[8] created by the W3C and User Agent Profile (UAProf) [3] created by the Open Mobile Alliance (formerly the WAP Forum). These standards allow the efficient transmission of delivery context information to the server even via low bandwidth wireless networks. B. Device Capabilities and Preferences Trying to specify a ELELTECH INDIA 2009
pattern in the
device’s representation and user’s preferences, the W3C proposed the CC/PP (Composite Capacities/Preferences Profiles). The CC/PP specification provides a general-purpose profile that can describe the capabilities of user agent and preferences of its user. The CC/PP framework specifies how client devices express their capabilities and preferences (the user agent profile) to the server that originates content (the origin server). The origin server uses the user agent profile to produce and deliver content, w hi c h is appropriate to the client device. In addition to the computer-based client devices, particular attention is being paid to other kinds of devices such as mobile phones. Using CC/PP, creators of Web devices and user agents can easily define precise profiles for their products. Web servers and proxies can use these profiles to adapt, through fine-tuned content selection or transformation, the content they serve to the needs of the Web device. UAProf (User agent profile) is an XML document that contains information about the user agent type and device capabilities. It is a standard defined and maintained by the Open Mobile Alliance (formerly the WAP Forum). It is a concrete CC/PP vocabulary dedicated to mobile phones and defines an efficient transmission of the CC/PP descriptions over wireless networks. Mobile phones complying with the UAProf specification provide CC/PP descriptions for their capabilities to servers. Content Servers use this information to optimize the content, where the information is communicated using XML containing the attributes such as screen size, color capability, audio capability, browser info, operating system, character sets and many more. WURFL stands for Wireless Universal Resource FiLe. The WURFL itself is an XML configuration file, which contains information about device capabilities and features for a variety of mobile devices. Developers around the world contribute device information and the WURFL is updated frequently reflecting new wireless devices coming on the market. DELI, an open source library originally developed at
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Dynamic Content Adaptation to Mobile Devices
HP Labs allows Java servlets to resolve HTTP requests containing delivery context information from CC/PP or UAProf capable devices and query the resolved profile. It also provides support for legacy devices so that the proprietary delivery context descriptions currently used by applications that can be replaced by standardized CC/PP descriptions. The eXtensible Dynamic Presentation Manager (XDPM)[9] Framework is a solution to adaptation or regeneration of contents in multimodal web application according to the used access device. It supports the Extensible Presentation Language (XPL) in the adaptation of contents to different working contexts. The adaptation is performed according to the delivery context information that have been formalized by means of a profiler system. A profile holds information about the specific access device, the user preferences and the device working conditions. This information is managed following the new approach taken by the Device Independence Working Group (DIWG) of W3C, and a profiling system has been adapted to our scope. Adopting this approach, the core model of the XPL has been used for the web page model creation. The system uses guidelines of the W3C Multimodal Interaction Framework (MMIF) to develop a framework that from the user point of view enables dynamic selection of access modality according to context preference and from the developer point of view supplies tools to easily develop interfaces for different purposes.
employs CC/PP technology to resolve the problem of learning service not being able to share and enhance the adaptiveness of learning management system to client devices. A range of technologies are emerging in an effort to solve problems related to delivering content. In our research, we explored Mobile JSF [5], which provides a JSF library and MobileFaces, to implement a reference solution about mobile devicespecific rendering for mobile applications based on Java EE. The experiment results are shown below, where the Fig 1 shows the view of the web page through a normal PC browser, which can be compared against Fig 2, that shows the view of the same web page rendered to a mobile device.
Fig. 1.
Web Page on Normal PC Browser
Fig. 2.
Web page on Mobile Browser
IV. CURRENT WORK In Ubiquitous networks, anyone can access content at any time from anywhere by using any appliances. One of the important applications on the ubiquitous network is learning. Existing learning Management Systems (LMS) are based on desktop environments, rather than mobile devices. These LMSs cannot deliver learning content in accordance to client device capabilities. This study develops a Ubiquitous Learning framework [4] that
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Dynamic Content Adaptation to Mobile Devices
V. CONCLUSION: The web can be accessed from any where, any time with different devices such as Personal desktop, laptop, palmtops, Mobile devices, PDAs etc., Different devices have different capabilities such as screen size, resolution, browser capabilities and many more. The purpose of adaptation is to render the content depending upon the requesting device. Early days, client devices are identified by the Accept Headers, but have some limitations and then the two standards have been created Composite Capabilities / Preferences Profile (CC/PP) and User Agent Profile (UAProf) created by the Open Mobile Alliance. Nowadays a range of technologies are emerging to improve the efficiency in delivering the content such as UAProf (User agent profile), WURFL (Wireless Universal Resource FiLe), Mobile JSF and many more. Depending on the platform and usage, any of the technology can be experimented.
ubiquitous Computing and web technologies for Learning, Ubiquitous Learning, International Journal, Volume number 1,2009 [5] Mobile JSF Kit, http://wendong.ngphone.com/mobile faces-mobile-jsf- kit from- Ericsson [6] Caoimhin O? Nuallain, Dr. Sam Redfern, DYNAMIC SCREEN GENERATION FOR THE MOBILE WIRELESS UBIQUITOUS LEARNING ENVIRONMENT, Exploring Innovation in Education and Research CEER2005 Tainan, Taiwan, 1-5 March 2005 [7] William C. Chu 1, Hong-Xin Lin, Context-Sensitive Content Representtat ion for Mobile Learning http://www.globus.org [8]http://www.w3.org/Mobile/CCPP/Hist oric-CCPP [9]http://semantics.eng.it
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT We are grateful to the Dept of IT, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Government of India for encouraging our efforts in pursuing research and development in the area of ubiquitous learning. And also we would like to convey special thanks to Dr.Sarat Chandra Babu Director C-DAC, Hyderabad for guiding us in this area.
REFERENCES [1] Teli Sonera Web Content Adaptation aper, August, 2004 [2] WURFL Wireless Universal Resource FiLe, https://wurfl.dev.java.net/ [3] UAProf User agent profile, www.wapforum.org/what/technical/S PECUAProf- 19991110.pdf [4] Dr.Sarat Chandra Babu, Radhika Khambam, Ramu Parupalli, Navajyothi Karna, Kumar Mandula, Blending Grid, ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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M-Learning Portal for Physically Handicapped
M-Learning Portal for Physically Handicapped Abstract
M V Ramana Murthy C-DAC Banglore Mr. M V Ramana Murthy, Networks Consultant Associate at CDAC, Electronics City graduated in Electronics and Communications Engineering. He was commissioned in Indian Air Force as Aeronautical Engineer (Electronics) and served for 31 years in various key appointments such as Project Engineer at Radar and Communications Project Office, Commanding officer of Communication Training institute and Director, Defense Communication Network. He did his post graduation in Communication engineering from IISc, Bangalore and in Management from Osmania University. He underwent Post graduate certificate Course in Business management from IIM, Ahmedabad. He is an experienced Telecommunication engineer with excellent exposure to IT and ATM/IP/MPLS Networks. He has steered various Projects including Distributed Message Switching Network and Trainee Information system for Indian Air Force. He has been serving at CDAC since May 2007.
E-learning solutions for on-line learning may be supposed to be attractive to physically challenged and may at first sight appear to offer them the flexible access they need, but it is well known experience for those working with disadvantaged young adults that sadly many handicapped are unable to access to such facilities due to inherent difficulties in access. The solution lies in M-Learning, i.e. in accessing learning opportunities via mobile technologies. M-Learning harnesses mobile technologies to address the social/Physical problems. Mobile Learning is the convergence of learning, the internet and mobile Technology. M Learning facilitates continuous education and daily learning. The Mobile Learning enables everybody to learn, wherever they want to learn, whenever they want to learn and whatever they want to learn. A user-friendly M Learning Portal with an appropriate Authoring System can be a powerful and empowering tool to create a conducive learning environment in its own right for the disabled/handicapped. CDAC, Electronics City has proposed a project for building up the portal with an Authoring System to meet the educational needs of Indian higher secondary schools. It is proposed to extend the scope to include education to physically challenged. Support to important Indian languages is also envisaged.
Index Terms—Authoring System for M Learning Portal, Mobile Learning, Physically Challenged, Support to Indian languages.
INTRODUCTION While around 15% of the disabled suffer from mental illness, psychiatric problems, brain injury, and behavioural difficulties, 75% require additional visual assistance (ranging from needing spectacles to using Braille or ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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M-Learning Portal for Physically Handicapped
hearing aids or signing). Accessibility by the disabled is one of the important aspects that prevented E-learning solutions for on-line learning by Physically challenged and are not popular as the disabled are not able to access such facilities due to inherent difficulties in access. Since these groups make up two thirds of the disabled community, even simple developments, such as allowing the user to switch between text and sound should increase the accessibility of Learning. Over one fifth of disabled Learners require voice or speech recognition software to communicate with computers and 28% require other technology to assist the physical manipulation of information. Technology has great potential to overcome physical barriers. Technology opened up a number of potential benefits and opportunities for the learners with disabilities. M Learning technology, which has now evolved into a set of interactive multimedia applications promises to help many disabled persons attain the education they deserve.
MOBILE LEARNING The mobile subscriber base in India is forecasted to grow at an unprecedented rate by the end of 2012. In the last financial year, total tele-density in the country reached 18.2 percent against 12.9 percent in previous year. Mobile is an important ICT tool even in remote and rural areas. The rapid advancement in the technologies, ease of use and the falling costs of devices, make the mobile an appropriate and adaptable tool to bridge the digital divide. A mobile phone based Learning System for the disabled will be an effective ICT tool for imparting quality education. Mobile services are quickly emerging as the new frontier in transforming services and making it even more accessible and citizen-centric by extending the benefits of remote delivery of services and information to those who are unable to access services through the Internet. M learning service can be now made available on a 24x7x365 basis at any
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place in India for the disabled since entire India is covered by mobile networks An interesting application of M-learning has been carried out by the Standford Learning Lab for the teaching of the English language. Students were given quizzes, glossaries, interactive audio-files, to improve their pronunciation and language skills. It was done first through SMS and then by means of videos. Mobile Learning, or M Learning as it is often called, is a relatively new tool in the pedagogical arsenal to assist the disabled as they navigate the options available in the expanding distance learning world. The advent of mobile technology brings in notable flexibility in the learning environment. Everyone owns a mobile phone and they outnumber computers as they are cheaply available. Nowadays every body usually carry their mobile phones with them and use them for sending e mails and short messages. Mobile phones provide immediate and continuous access to data irrespective of where the person is. M Learning can assure good educational opportunities for the disabled. M Learning’s use with the traditional education will turn out to be an excellent learning platform due to it’s flexibility.
Hamburg, I. Hamburg, A. Gavota, M. and Lazea, M described an example of incorporating wireless technology within an e-learning environment in the European project EURO H for the disabled people by using new technologies [1]. Seppala and Alamaki [2] investigated the training using mobile technology in the classroom. The pilot study was carried out at the Department of Home Economics and Craft Science in University of Helsinki. The idea of the pilot was that the supervising teacher and trainee students could discus and share their ideas about teaching methods through the mobile device and use of a short message service (SMS) and digital pictures as a part of the supervising process. In their study, content material was sent to a centralized memory bank. Each user could "withdraw" this material at any time for review and study. Ben Moussa, C opined that the Mobile
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M-Learning Portal for Physically Handicapped
Learning converts a worker’s dead time into a productive activity [3]. Thornton and Houser [4] have reported on their study of data and opinions regarding M Learning and its use in a Japanese University. In their study, the investigators evaluated outcome measures for classroom material using mobile phones, both via e-mail and using WAP technology for web enabled phones. The researchers observed improvements in test scores ranging from between 35% and 75%, using pre-post test measures over paper materials alone. The students' reactions to this new learning opportunity were positive. The researchers noted that since the cell-phone is so well established in Japan, distributing educational material through them was a relatively painless process. M Learning has shown increasing penetration at the professional level as well. Pulchino [5] revealed in research published for the E-Learning Guild, collaboration of several different business organizations to educate their workforce through mobile learning.
III
MOBILE LEARNING FOR THE DISABLED
M-learning can also offer educational opportunities to impaired students in order to overcome some of the barriers encountered in a traditional learning. Visual impaired learners can use PDAs with text to speech software installed. Luvai F. Motiwalla and Jialun Qin proposed a generic speech technology enhanced M Learning architecture to reduce access barriers to handicapped [6]. Deaf learners can take advantage of the rich visual content of photos and images. Dyslexic learners can receive benefits from navigating web resources and also use the rich visual material offered by PDAs. Some models of Nokia phones read the messages out loud with Text-to-speech tool which allows to listen to text messages, multimedia messages, and emails. Text-to-speech uses the Message Reader application built into compatible Series 60 mobile phones. To use ELELTECH INDIA 2009
Text-to-speech, we need to install one language package and a corresponding voice package also. Free down loads are available for the Java phones. Similarly an easy to use text input method lets users create text messages by saying what they want rather than having to use the keypad. In addition to creating messages, the software allows users to enter text into any text based application on the phone that uses text entry, including: SMS, MMS, email, notes, calendar, and office documents, simply by using their voice. IV. INDIA
ROLE OF REGIONAL LANGUAGES IN
In India, in all: 1,650 languages, more than 400 are used as languages of communication. Among the latter, 22 are spoken by 75% of Indians and are listed in the Indian constitution. Hindi, the official Indian union language along with English, is spoken by only 40% of the Indian population. Since its independence in 1947, the country has been putting into effect educational policies aimed at mass literacy and economic development – key factors to unite people split into a multitude of religions, languages, castes and cultures. Over the 12 years of primary and secondary school education, instructions are given in the mother or regional language from the first to the fifth year, and three language formula is used in the sixth year. Therefore, the proposed M Learning portal needs to be deployed in prominent regional languages also in addition to English and Hindi for it to be effective. V. M-LEARNING PORTAL IN REGIONAL LANGUAGES FOR THE DISABLED CDAC, Electronics City has proposed a project for building up an M Learning portal frame work for the Indian Higher Secondary School Education. It is proposed to extend the scope of the project to cover the physically handicapped with an Authoring System to provide content with graphics, interaction, and other tools for meeting their educational needs. Support to important Indian languages is also envisaged. A Central repository of
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M-Learning Portal for Physically Handicapped
Content Management System with a Web interface is proposed to be developed using Open source software modules. GPRS/3G compatible mobile devices are expected to be used by the disabled with java based client software. The administrators can install the software on a server and make the content available for mobile use. They can configure and maintain the system through the integrated administration interface. The administrators can design courses using different tools and methodologies. The planned features are as follows: (a) The content can be created even through integrated cam device or record an audio comment or choose a previously recorded multimedia file. (b) Choices can also be created by administrator and can be accessed through clients. (c) Resources available through links or images or video or audio can be accessed. (d) Messages can be sent to the mobile users by the administrator/ trainer. (e) Learning objects can vary from simple offline resources like texts to interactive elements like quizzes. (f) Mobile blogging. V. THE ARCHITECTURE OF M LEARNING PORTAL The sub-systems of the M Learning portal are (a) A Central Information Repository of M learning content in an open source database. (b) Web server (c) Mobile Applications Server. (d) Speech Engine with Text to speech software modules. (e) Speech to text Software Module.
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(f) Localization Module for providing interface for translation to local languages. The
Authoring tools developed are:
proposed
to
be
(a) SMS Authoring Tool. A simple technology with a wide reach, the SMS quiz engine is an immensely powerful tool. SMS Authoring Tool is a way to engage the handicapped through SMS quizzes. Learners answer questions through their phone. Feedback can be tailored through the tool. The combination of paper/web/SMS based questions and SMS replies can be very effective on students.
(b) Mobile Learning Author. Learning Author is a set of easy-to-use software tools that enable trainers to create vibrant learning activities for learners to run on mobile devices. It enables flexible learning. Allows learners to improve skills at their own pace and discretion. My Learning Author developed at CDAC provides following functionalities to its user: (i) Select the mode of learning environment:- It defines in which mode we want to learn like by multiple choice quiz or by reading the text file containing the topic description with its images. (ii)Test his knowledge using multiple choice quizzes: In this functionality user can go for quiz. There will be a question with its four choices. User has to select one option and then submit it. On submitting, they get an instant feedback displaying “well done!!!” in case of correct answer and “please try again” in case of wrong answer. And after that they
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M-Learning Portal for Physically Handicapped
can go for next question by selecting next. (iii)Learn about particular topic by selecting from a list of topics: Through this user can learn about different topics. There is description about different topics with its image. User has to select the topic and give read command to read that particular topic. (c) Books in a Phone. The tool facilitates formatting the books and packaged so that the handicapped users can read them on a java enabled phone. The book reader program is integrated within each downloadable book. The features of the tool include adjustable font size settings, pause & auto-resume and auto-bookmark. (d) MediaBoard. This tool allows teachers/trainers to create interactive learning tasks and projects for groups of learners. Each mediaBoard, a teacher creates is rather like an Internet message board but consists of a visual image. Learners can attach audio, text and images to areas of the image, sending these by e-mail or by multi-media message (MMS) from a mobile phone. MediaBoard provides facility to collaborate as a team, sharing knowledge and opinions and upload and share photographs. VI. THE OBJECTIVE OF M LEARNING PORTAL The M Learning portal for the disabled in Indian languages will seek to achieve: (a) Opportunity for on line training of the distant and widely dispersed disabled. (b) Increased quality of Professional competence in trainers. ELELTECH INDIA 2009
(c) Increased efficiency of on job training of trainers. (d) Improved accessibility of resources by the disabled.
Conclusion Imparting technology education to the disabled is most important aspect of education to the disabled. MLearning is one of the important tools for educating the disabled who are spread across length and breadth of India. M Learning in regional languages is extremely useful in India because it promises the best use of their time and ensures accelerated learning even though the disabled are geographically dispersed. In this paper, the details of the modules of the proposed system and important features have been brought out. The M Learning portal will offer great opportunity for the disabled. REFERENCES [1] . Hamburg, I. Hamburg, A. Gavota, M. Lazea, M., Inst. Arbeit und Technik, Gelsenkirchen, Germany, “Integrating wireless technology in e-learning for disabled” in Information and Communication Technologies: From Theory to Applications, 2004. Proceedings. 2004 International Conference , 23 April 2004 [2] Seppala P. & Alamaki H. (2003) Mobile Learning in Teacher Training in Journal of Computer Assisted Learning.B. Smith, “An approach to graphs of linear forms (Unpublished work style),” unpublished. [3] E. H. Ben Moussa, C, “Workers on the move: new opportunities through mobile commerce”, presented at the Stockholm Mobility Roundtable, May 2003, pp 2233. [4] Thornton P. & Houser C. (2005) “Using mobile phones in English education in Japan”. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning.
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M-Learning Portal for Physically Handicapped
[5] Pullchino J. (2006) “Mobile Learning Research Report”. The E-Learning Guild. http://www.elearningguild.com/ [6] Luvai F. Motiwalla and Jialun Qin, “Enhancing Mobile Learning using Speech Recognition Technologies”, Eigth World Congress on the Management of e Business (WC MeB 2007)
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Tools for Language Learning
Tools for Language Learning delivered the Sarada Ranganathan Endowment Lectures in 2004. He is a member / chairperson of several national level committees relating to standards language technologies, egovernance, elearning etc.
Kavi Narayana Murthy University of Hyderabad, Hyderabad Dr. Kavi Narayana Murthy is a Professor at University of Hyderabad. Prior to that, he has worked in reputed private and public sector companies for about 5 years. He worked for Radar Division, Bharat Electronics, Ministry of Defence. He has been a Visiting Faculty at Indian Statistical Institute, Bangalore and AU-KBC Research Centre, Chennai. He is currently a Fellow of the Institute at Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL), Mysore (March 2009 to February 2011). His areas of Research Interest include Natural Language Engineering and Speech Technologies. He has authored a text book on Natural Language Processing and published over 50 research papers in reputed journals and international conferences. He specializes in computational grammars and has been developing a system of computational syntax called UCSG. He has worked on the development of corpora, lexical resources including dictionaries, thesauri, morphological anaylzers and generators, POS tagging, Chunking, etc. for English and Indian languages including Kannada and Telugu.
His other interests include Classical Music, Sanskrit and various aspects of Ancient Indian Tradition including Yoga, Ayurveda and Vedanta. He works for the all-round well-being of the individual as well as of human society as a whole by conducting free courses, publications in electronic and print media etc. He has published a booklet entitled 'ahimsa'. Another booklet entitled 'brahmacarya' is available in electronic form. His book entitled "Science of Life" is in the pipeline. He has been offering month-long courses on self improvement yooga which include aasanas, praaNaayama, dhyaana (meditation), topics from pataMjali's yooga suutra-s as also fundamental discussions on the true nature of the self, of the universe, of the relations between the two and so on, clear understanding of which will enable one to live a full, meaningful and worthy life.
He has visited and delivered lectures at University of Paris, INRIA and UNESCO, under invitation from French National Commission for the UNESCO and INRIA. He as the Indian coordinator the Indo-French Research Network in Computational Linguistics for the years 2001 - 2004. He
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Tools for Language Learning
learning throws a great opportunity in this context.
1. Introduction: While eLearning is now quite mature and a number of successful applications exist in technical subjects, learning natural languages poses a different set of opportunities and challenges from an eLearning perspective. Not much seems to have happened towards this end. In this talk we shall explore some of these opportunities and challenges, especially in the Indian context. We have many languages in the world. There are more than 150 or 200 different languages in our country, with several dialectal variations. Twenty two of these have the constitutional recognition. English and Hindi are the official languages of the union of India and state governments have their own official languages. There is really no single language that binds us all today into a single coherent nation. Economics, business, industrial relations cannot be carried out in any one Indian language that is convenient to all of us. So we use English. This conference and most other conferences, meetings, discussions, debates happen in English. Even discussions on Indian languages often happen in English, which is not native to our country. There are at least 4 different language families with very different characteristics, from which our own native languages come. These factors make language a crucial issue in the development of the individual and our society as a whole. We all need to learn several languages even to simply survive and carry on day to day business within our own country. We all pick our mother tongue, our first language, automatically at childhood without need for any teaching or training. But we need to put in conscious effort to learn a second language. Often we wish to learn a language but we do not have the time to go to a formal school for the purpose. Self
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2. Learning a Language: What do we mean when we say we know a language? Of course we must know the vocabulary, the words of the language. But there is more to it than simply knowing the words of a language. We must also know how we can put these words into appropriate structures so that we can convey the thoughts and ideas we have in a precise and clear way to achieve an intended purpose of communication. We must know the rules of this game, called a grammar or syntax, so that we can speak out structurally correct and hence meaningful utterances and we can also analyze and understand what others say. Further, we must know how to use sentences appropriately to construct a whole coherent discourse. It is not necessary to study and learn grammar explicitly in order to learn a language and to communicate effectively in that language. We all learned our mother tongue at a very early age just by listening to others speaking this language at home. In this process, we actually learn and internalize a grammar in our minds. This process is unconscious and we may not know exactly what kind of grammar we have with us but the fact remains that we all carry grammars of the languages we know in our heads. We carry the vocabulary in our heads too. It is extremely important that we carry the right knowledge of words and the right grammar in our heads. Effective communication is the most important skill in today's world of stiff competition in every field. Other things being equal, those with better communicative skills come up very well in every profession. There is another even more important
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Tools for Language Learning
reason - language and thought are closely, almost inseparably inter-connected. In fact thought is nothing but silent speech. Without a proper grip on language, we are disabled at the very core ourselves, namely thinking. It is thinking and talking that set us apart from all other living beings. Human civilization and all the progress and advancements that we are so proud of, are not possible without a mastery of language and thought. Let us not take language lightly. In this talk let us restrict ourselves to the study of words. It is not enough to simply list all the words in the language and associate each word with its meaning. Words themselves have complex structure and the meaning follows from this internal structure. The study of internal structure of words is called Morphology. Indian languages are rich in morphology. In particular, Dravidian languages such as Telugu and Kannada are among the most complex languages in the whole world when it comes to morphological structure. We often blame outsides for not picking up our local language but we must also realize that picking up a language may not be that easy. In the rest of this talk we shall illustrate the use of appropriate technologies to help somebody learn the morphology of a language. Even knowing words is a great help because Indian languages have many things in common and we can manage to communicate in a minimal sense even if we just have knowledge of the words.
3. Tools for Language Learning: Here we shall briefly sketch the toolkit being developed by our group for Indian languages. We hope to build a comprehensive language engineering toolkit comprising of a number of tools to develop, analyze, experiment-with, at all levels of linguistic description including corpora, dictionaries, thesauri, wordnets, morphological analyzers and generators, spell checkers, POS tagging, chunking and shallow parsing, full parsing, named
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entity recognition and classification, word sense disambiguation etc. These tools and technologies will catalyze the further development of applications such as machine translation, information retrieval, information extraction, automatic summarization, question answering etc. in Indian languages. The toolkit will also cater to the needs of language teaching and language learning. Here we shall restrict ourselves to morphology of Indian languages. Let us take examples from Kannada. Telugu is very similar. A dictionary lists the root forms of words. These root forms can be inflected to obtain more word forms. For example, we can obtain 'eating', 'eats', 'eaten' and 'ate' from the root word 'eat'. Ask yourself how many different word forms can be obtain for the word corresponding to 'eat' in your language. Students often come out with small numbers such as 10 or 15 to start with. After giving some examples, they revise their estimates and say 25 or 50. We rarely realize that we can obtain thousands and thousands of word forms from a single verb root in a language like Kannada or Telugu. Words in our languages have a complex structure, involving several parts called morphemes. For example, the word 'tinnabeekaagidditeMbudee' (the fact that it was required to eat, was in itself) can be analyzed as 'tinnu + alu + beeku+ aagu + i + iru + id + itu + ennu + uvudu + ee' Here there is a verb root followed by 10 suffixes. There is internal samdhi or conflation taking place between successive parts. Thus 'tinnu + alu' become 'tinnalu' and 'tinnalu + beeku' becomes 'tinnabeeku' as per the rules of the language. There is also external samdhi taking place when another verb 'ennu' is getting added. There is derivation taking place when the suffix 'uvudu' is added to obtain a gerund, a noun-like word, from the original verb. Native speakers use these words in their daily life without realizing the complexity of the task they are doing unconsciously. Language learners will have substantial difficulty in understanding all these complex processes.
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Tools for Language Learning
It is important to understand the structure of words because the meaning comes from such an analysis.
can be automated. With adequate reference and teaching materials, this can be a very effective tool in language teaching and language learning.
We can capture the suffixes in the language and the particular combinations they enter into, using a Finite State Automaton. The FSA captures all aspects of morphology except the samdhi rules, which can be coded separately. The FSA captures the morphological grammar of the language in a simple, computationally efficient, human readable, easily maintainable and re-usable form. The grammar can be used bidirectionally, both for analysis and generation. A wide coverage computational grammar is being developed for Indian languages, Kannada and Telugu to start with, using this technology. A small change can render the word ungrammatical and meaningless or completely change the meaning. 'carce beeDa' means 'let us not argue' but 'carcee beeDa' may mean 'churches are not required'!. 'eMTu hattu' means '8, 10', 'eMTuu hattu' means 'tens minutes past eight O'clock', and 'eMThattu' means 'about 8 or 10'. 'maaDida' means 'that which was done' and 'maaDada' means 'that which was not done'. Even native speakers sometimes make mistakes. We therefore need tools and technologies to help formulate a complete reference grammar for our languages and use that for language learning and teaching. This tool can be used effectively for language learning. The FSA can be depicted graphically and the particular route taken in analyzing a given word can be highlighted, showing the details of the samdhi processes and the associated grammatical and semantic information in human readable and easily understandable form on demand. Alternatives tried can be traced. The same tool can be used to visually see and understand how word forms are generated starting from a given root word. We can do what-if experiments by changing the dictionary and/or the grammar. We can compare and contrast grammars of different languages. Glossing ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning
Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning Abstract:
Geeta Bose Kern Learning Solutions Pvt. Ltd. Bose Geeta, Founder and Director Processes and Operations, Kern Learning Solutions Pvt. Ltd. Masters in Business Administration from Indira Gandhi Open University and Post Graduate Diploma in Journalism from Indian Institute of Mass Communication. She has over 12 years of experience in the writing and learning domain. Before Geeta founded Kern, she was an instructional designer and language expert at NIIT and Wipro. She started out her career as a journalist working with leading dailies and magazines like The Asian Age, The Hindustan Times, and Business Today. Geeta has authored books on business writing, project management, and an undergraduate level English textbook "Composition," published by ATI Technical University, USA. Geeta is passionate about instructional design and has evolved a methodology called Learner Centered Methodology to drive learning solutions at Kern. She also judges the annual Brandon Hall awards. Geeta is a member of the Instructional Design Community of India and also speaks at the forum. She is also an active member of Corporate Learning Trends and Innovation.
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According to Learner Centered Methodology (LCM), all courses are learner-focused. They are designed to enable learners to achieve their learning outcomes and increase ROI of stakeholders. This methodology is based on proven research in human factors engineering, which has techniques, processes, and procedures to design usercentered products. This methodology has been successfully put to practice in many live projects. Index Terms — Learner-centered methodology, learner testing, contextual inquiry and evaluation.
INTRODUCTION Most eLearning courses are content-centered rather than learner-centered. While instructional designers go through the various phases of audience analysis, content analysis, and requirements analysis, they seldom incorporate the outcomes of the analysis into the course design. In most cases, the motivations of stakeholders, technology constraints, and project deadlines take precedence over the learners’ needs in an eLearning program. Often learning strategies and pedagogy are driven by the type of content rather than by the needs of learners. The decisions to use case studies, themes, or particular instructional strategies are based on the type of content covered rather than the profile of learners. Consequently, the pedagogy is far removed from the learner’s motivation. In this scenario, an entry-level manager as well as a CEO may be subjected to the same eLearning program with neither benefiting from it.
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Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning
Very few eLearning programs are actually aligned to the motivations of the learner from the analysis phase down to the micro design of the course. Let us understand the methodology in detail. To overcome this expectation mismatch, we have evolved the LCM methodology. We design and develop courseware based on the philosophy that the learner is at the center of the eLearning process. In this process, the development life cycle (DLC) has the learner as the focal point. Every step in the DLC derives from the study of learners.
Principles of LCM Key Principles of LCM LCM is an evolutionary approach. The final courseware is shaped over time. The instructional designers arrive at the optimum design through an iterative process of validating with the learning outcomes at all phases and steps in the eLearning development phase. 1. Learner is at the center of the development process. 2. LCM is an iterative process. Every phase involves iterations within the phase before becoming input for the next phase. 3. This is a diagnostic approach to eLearning, which is in contrast to a quick-fix approach.
1. Definite increase in the productivity of employees from day one 2. Reduction in peer-review time, rework, and supervision 3. Reduction in learning time on the job 4. Increase in first-time correct deliverables 5. Supervisors have time for other things 6. Longer and better retention Phases in LCM Approach LCM is an evolutionary approach. The final courseware is shaped over time. The instructional designers arrive at the optimum design through an iterative process of validating with the learning outcomes at all phases and steps in the eLearning development phase.
Fig. 1. Typical phases and steps in elearning development process
Various tests, checks, and validations at each phase of the DLC provide inputs that help designers understand learners’ goals, motivations, expectations, and learning behavior. Each test is a scientific approach that elicits information from learner. This information is ploughed back into the DLC to ensure that the focus of the courseware is always on the learner.
Benefits to Stakeholders and Clients Typical eLearning approach promises clients ROI by saving on the costs of classroom training, increasing productivity with just-intime training, and saving on delivery time. This is only 25% of the potential gains that the client can derive from the LCM approach. An eLearning courseware designed with the LCM approach offers the following benefits:
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Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning
Fig. 2. The typical tests, checks, and validation mechanisms at each phase in the DLC. Influence of LCM on the Micro Design of the Course Visual – The visuals, images, video, audio, and other media used are based on information derived about learners in the learner analysis phase. The use of these elements is evaluated while creating the high-level design document. The use of each visual element is derived from research about learner’s goal. Writing Style – This is perhaps the single most element that is derived directly from learner analysis by most instructional designers. Written information that is part of elearning should be concise and to the point. Interactive – An advantage of LCM is that design factors in the learners preferences and motivations. Learners can interact with the courseware through quizzes and multimedia activities that let them practice skills, demonstrate knowledge, discover relationships and new information, and reinforce learning. Engaging – Appeal to the learner’s professional experience and their emotions. Use case-based learning and scenarios that get the learner to analyze and synthesize information and put it within a frame of reference. Ask the learner to make decisions
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or judgments relevant to the case-based learning and scenarios. Relevant – E-learning should address a learner’s current needs or learning gaps. In addition, developers must maintain the accuracy of the content. Revisit elearning content on a regular basis to ensure that it is still relevant and accurate for your audience. Feasible – Make sure that the technologies you choose for enabling elearning are feasible for your learners and their learning environments. If your audience is using 56K modems, be mindful of that limitation in choosing media and tools for creating your elearning experience. Empowering – Provide access to additional resources for more information so that the self-directed learner can explore content relevant to their interests and learn more.
LCM – A Case Study Let’s understand the phases of LCM using one of our live project case studies. Kern designed a training program on Grooming and Personality Development for the customer service executives (CSEs) of Godrej & Boyce for their Godrej Lifespace Stores across India. This was a program designed and developed using LCM. The crux of Kern’s LCM methodology is that the learner is at the centre of the development process. The training solutions are proposed only after analyzing learners’ needs and requirements. This course was a 2008 Brandon Hall Excellence in Learning Award winner.
Phase I: Learner Research Kern began the project with a detailed learner analysis across 15 stores using contextual inquiry and ethnographic research methods. Kern visited Godrej’s Lifespace stores across 15 locations to observe and speak to the customer service executives (CSEs) – our eventual learners. We spent time observing them at work, gathering information about their demographics, speaking to their store chiefs, and gathering information about their work environment,
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Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning
their motivations, their aspirations, and expectations. This method of gathering data about learners is called contextual inquiry. Contextual inquiry findings helped Kern arrive at the following: 1. Learning objectives of the program 2. Persona creation – a male CSE and a female CSE 3. Constraints in G&B’s existing training scenario (refer Appendix 1) 4. Understanding of the learners (graduates with average English speaking skills, proficient in local lanauges, possess good product knowledge but poor dressing and presentation skills) 5. Identify the learning challenges of learners (refer Appendix 2) 6. Define the evaluation metrics to map the learning outcome later 7. Define the ID review parameters based on the learner analysis
Phase 2: Design and Prototyping Based on the contextual inquiry findings, Kern proposed the following blended solution to G&B: 1. A self-paced eLearning program for CSEs in their respective stores 2. A two-day workshop for store chiefs to help them: a) Implement the eLearning program in their stores b) Mentor the CSEs c) Monitor their performance d) Evaluate their performance Supporting learning interventions in the stores such as one-on-one mentoring, posters and checklists, and the audio system in the store to help CSEs recall and remember information over longer duration. An analysis of the contextual inquiry findings helped the instructional design team arrive at the following design directions for the self-paced program. a) The course has to be highly visual ELELTECH INDIA 2009
for quick comprehension b) Clear demarcations for men and women as certain topics are only for women and men need not go through it and vice versa. c) The course content must be modular. A quick gain attention screens for every learning nugget to give the CSE a positive and optimistic feel. d) Option for audio in different languages e) Every nugget should be short and end with quizzes f) Two categories of content: Understand (knowledge and comprehension level) and demonstrate (application level). Design two basic strategies for each. g) Indicate “current viewing” and “already viewed.” This needs to be checked with regard to development constraints. h) The learning nuggets on the Menu have to be self-explanatory so that the learner can quickly decide which topic they want to go through. An instructional audit of the design document helped us map the instructional approaches to the learner analysis findings from the contextual inquiry. The training development team used review checklists to map the design with the findings of contextual inquiry. The development team and the subject matter experts (SME) mapped the training methods to the learner personae. The issues marked out in the checklist were debated and a consensus was reached so that the program design mapped most to the learner requirements. The design was then presented to the stakeholders who provided valuable inputs to the discussion and signedoff the design document. Benefits: Training gaps were spotted well in advance. This helped reduce 80% of rework that typically happen when training is evaluated post delivery.
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Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning
Phase 3: Development Based on these design inputs, Kern designed a self-paced CD-based module for G&B. To meet the learning objectives, the course has 14 learning nuggets and each nugget does not exceed 10 minutes. Since both male and female CSEs had different learning needs, the course offered options to the learners to chose “Male” or “Female” to see their respective nuggets. At every step in the process, QA of the storyboards involved instructional design reviews (ID) and SME reviews. ID reviews ensured that the content mapped to the learner’s needs, wants, and motivations. The SME review helped validate content accuracy and the language reviews ensured that the language was lucid and mapped to learner’s level of comprehension. Keeping in mind the learning style of learners, the screens are more visual than textual. Also, most concepts are visually explained supplemented by video and a transcript of the audio. The course design was such that it could be easily translated into multiple languages.
Learner Testing 14 CSEs from the stores across 4 cities were recruited to go through the “learnability” testing (similar to usability testing) of the self-paced training program. In learnability testing, the CSEs are asked to go through the program as they would in real life. The tester observes the learners as they go thorough the program. The tester notes down observations and also questions to understand certain actions taken by the learners. At this stage, testers clearly distinguish between learner’s opinions and learner’s actions. The observations made are analyzed and changes incorporated in the self-paced program for a final release. Benefits: Development team could fix 99% of the problems, bugs, and value-adds that typically emerge post final release. This ELELTECH INDIA 2009
saved the company valuable time and money that goes into fixing the courses post final release. Since learner testing happens in a “reallike” environment, it helped the company test the course implementation mechanisms. Consequently, there were no hiccups during the final release. Apart from course-related findings, learnability testing also threw up interesting results about the company’s processes and practices. These were valuable inputs for the company. For example, most learners were unhappy with the quality of uniforms, while some learners felt that uniforms violated their cultural sensitivity. Phase 4: Implementation & Evaluation The program had two components, online program and workshop. The workshop was designed to familiarize the store chiefs with the eLearning program so that later in the stores they could act as mentors for CSEs. During the workshop, store chiefs were provided handouts and checklists for evaluation and intervention. It trained the store chiefs on ways to implement training, observe CSEs, and intervene with corrective actions. During the workshop, the store chiefs learned how to use the evaluation checklist, conduct quiz and weekly discussion sessions. They also learned to use supporting training tools such as one-on-one mentoring, posters, checklists, and the audio system in the stores.
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Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning
• Post-assessments included in the selfpaced eLearning program Complete Training Evaluation
Fig. 3. Some screen shots from the eLearning course
Learnability Evaluation & Measuring Learning Effectiveness Kern offered a payment-linked guarantee of effectiveness of the training program to G&B. Therefore, Kern and G&B agreed upon a set of evaluation parameters at the beginning of the program. The evaluation methodology adopted here attempts to measure the success of the program in terms of increased business benefits such as: • Minimize rework • Improve productivity • Save time • Save money The tools used to evaluate the workshop, the self-paced training, and the complete training program, are listed below. Workshop Evaluation The trainer conducts written tests at the end of the workshop for store chiefs attending the workshop. This evaluates the knowledge-level skills of store chiefs. The trainer conducts role-play competitions and group presentations at the end of the workshop for store chiefs to evaluate their behavioral skills. Self-Paced Training Evaluation
• The store chief conducts quiz contests among the CSEs in the respective stores to test their immediate recall and retention of information one week after they have completed the program. • The store chiefs conduct another quiz contest 15 days after they complete the training program to test their recall and retention of knowledge over a little longer duration. • The store chiefs monitor and rate the behavioral skills of learners using an evaluation checklist (refer Appendix-3) • One week after the implementation of training program in the respective stores, the store chiefs start monitoring the CSEs’ attitudes and skills. They rate the CSEs on the parameters defined using the evaluation checklist, which is online on their intranet. • This evaluation happens again after 2 weeks. The store chiefs rate the CSEs and monitor their progress. • They conduct one-on-one monitoring sessions with laggards and group sessions to felicitate high performers. This motivates other CSEs to perform better. • The store chiefs again rate the CSEs after 25 days. This rating reflects the long-term retention of skills and behavior by learners. • The final scores of each CSE is the summation of the store chief’s ratings and the individual quiz scores.
Results of the Training Program Grooming
• Pre-assessments included in the selfpaced eLearning program ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning
Helpful Hints
Figures and Tables
not undergone the training.The Management Review Reports showed lower attrition in the stores that had undergone the Grooming and Personality Development training. The CSEs in these stores had higher job satisfaction and more pride in their work than the stores that had not undergone the training. Change in Mindset towards Training
Personal Hygiene
The workshop training helped store chiefs rehearse their mentoring role that they would play in their stores. It also helped store chiefs buy in to the actual benefits of the training program. The involvement of store chiefs in the actual training evaluation gave them a greater sense of ownership towards the training program. This helped them overcome their initial resistance to training. Customer Management
Effective Learning Before G&B followed the blended learning approach, 87% of learning was lost within 30 days of the classroom training conducted. With the blended learning approach, 80% of learners showed 90% improvement in retaining knowledge-level information about Grooming and Personality Development skills. Post training, 78% learners showed 80% improvement in personality development skills. Increased Training Coverage
Benefits from the Training Program The two Mystery Shoppers Audits conducted post-training implementation revealed that stores who had undergone the training had better groomed people. These stores sold better than the stores who had ELELTECH INDIA 2009
Earlier, G&B had 8-10 classroom training for new joiners in batch sizes of 12-15. With the blended learning approach, the training coverage increased manifold: Now it had to conduct only one classroom training/workshop for store chiefs at a regional level. Since each region has around 15 stores, one workshop helped train 15 store chiefs simultaneously.
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Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning
Each store chief then implements the selfpaced eLearning program in his/her respective stores. Therefore, about 75 CSEs in 15 stores are trained simultaneously with the training effort of one workshop. Earlier, there was no scope for refresher training. With the self-paced training option, each store chief can recommend the CSEs for refresher training without depending on the corporate training calendar or sanction. Cost Saving Earlier G&B incurred INR 300,000 per workshop. It could conduct at the most 10 such workshops for 150 CSEs in a year. CSEs had to travel from their base locations to the head office to attend these training. The stores had to incur an opportunity cost in their absence. While earlier workshops could train only a maximum of 150 CSEs in a year, the need was to train at least 700 CSEs per year. With the blended learning approach, G&B incurs a one-time cost of INR 500,000 on the self-paced module and INR 300,000 on the workshop for store chiefs. Now the only recurring cost is the single workshop at a regional level for store chiefs and ZERO cost on training CSEs in stores using the self-paced training module.
Conclusion The Learner Centered Methodology can be successfully used to design learning solutions for various learning needs. In fact, using this methodology it is easy to evolve the most appropriate mode of delivery of training as well as the relevant evaluation mechanisms to be used to evaluate the training. We have used this methodology in designing pure eLeanring courses, in designing pure classroom training courses, as well as in designing blended learning solutions.
scenario was to train 1000s of CSEs simultaneously across the length and breadth of the country. Not all new CSEs are able to attend the induction program as soon as they join. They can attend the induction program as per the training schedule and subject to vacancies in the batches. At times, CSEs find a slot in the training sessions after one year of joining the organization. Due to the training constraint, most CSEs come to the shop floor without training. They take 3-4 months to become productive. However, the company ideally wants trained people on the shop floor to handle customers better. 1. Since the training calendar is finalized at the beginning of the financial year, there is no opportunity for need-based training or refresher training. However, most stores need refresher training. 2. G&B has aggressive plans to set up new stores across the country. However, the current training plan cannot support more than 8-10 training programs in a year. 3. Since there is no follow-up training, retention of learning is very low among the CSEs. Apart from post assessments, there is no other evaluation mechanism. Hence, the business benefits from these training sessions are not measured. Contextual Inquiry Findings – Learning Challenges Based on the contextual inquiry findings, the instructional design team discovered the following challenges:
Appendix Contextual Inquiry Findings - Constraints in G&B’s Old Training Scenario During contextual inquiry, we realized that the biggest constraint in the existing training ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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Learner Centered Methodology – A New Approach to Effective Learning
a. Learner’s grasp of English was poor. English was needed to interact with the customers. b. The training would be localized in the regional languages later. c. Learners could only devote approximately 10 minutes learning time per sitting.
f.
Chalk out individual action plan for improvement for these areas
REFERENCES [1] Jeffery Rubin, “Handbook of Usability Testing” [2] W. Allen Michael “Michael Allen’s Guide to e-Learning”
d. The training was supposed to bring about a behavioral change among learners. The team had to handle sensitive issues such as personal dress sense and personal hygiene in a multi-cultural scenario. e. Motivation among learners was low as most of them are on contract basis and attrition rates are very high. f.
The team had to ensure that learners understand the important of grooming and personality development.
g. The team had to ensure that the store chiefs could play the role of a mentor. Interventions by Store Chief a. Rating each person as per the evaluation checklist between 5 to 7 days of training, 10-15 days, and 20-25 days b. Group session within 1-2 days after the rating c. Individual feedback from each person on whether they have understood the training, what are the major learning, and if there are any questions - through a group meeting d. Recognize high scorers in the meeting, help others to learn more by demonstrating role play or asking questions e. Give sensitive feedback individually - especially for areas where the rating is 2 or less
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Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments
Extending Moodle Assessments
to
Support
Offline
Harmeet Kumar Saini Archana Rane C-DAC Mumbai Ms. Archana Rane is a Senior Staff Scientist in Educational Technology unit of C-DAC Mumbai and is associated with C-DAC for about 6.5 years. Her research interests include Assessment Technologies, Learning Management Systems, Constructive Learning Environments and Language Tutoring. She has also been a faculty in a number of courses. She graduated from Mumbai University and did her post-graduation from Karnataka University.
C-DAC Mumbai Mr. Harmeet Kumar Saini is working in Educational Technology Unit of CDAC Mumbai since last 1 year and is a part of Moodle development Team. He got his engineering degree from Kurukshetra University.
Dr M Sasikumar C-DAC Mumbai
Akshay Kumar C-DAC Mumbai Mr. Akshay Kumar is a Staff Scientist in Educational Technology unit of C-DAC Mumbai and is associated with C-DAC for about 5 years. His research interests include Content Design, Learning Management Systems, Constructive Learning Environments and Teaching Methodologies. He has also been a faculty in a number of courses. He got his engineering degree from Vinoba Bhave University and did his post-graduation from Karnataka University.
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Dr M Sasikumar has been with CDAC Mumbai for over 20 years, and currently heads its Artificial Intelligence, Educational Technology, Open Source Software, Language Computing and Computer Graphics divisions. He has ideated and guided a number of software research and development projects, been a faculty in a number of courses, and closely associated with overall management of CDAC Mumbai activities. He is also author of two books. Sasikumar graduated from IIT Madras (now Chennai) and did his postgraduation from IISc Bangalore followed by Doctorate from BITS, Pilani.
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Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments
Abstract: Conducting objective-type exams using online testing tools is becoming popular in academics as well as corporate. This increasing popularity is due to the various benefits offered by such tools such as reduced time and effort due to automated evaluation of objective-type questions; ease in analysis of exam data stored in electronic form, availability of sophisticated reports and statistics, auto-updation in the grade book, question banking facility, etc. But, often objective-exams are still conducted in an offline mode – using OMR sheets for example, mainly due to infrastructure constraints, lack of technical support, security and recovery concerns, etc. It will be useful if such offline exams can also utilize the benefits offered by an online testing tool. However most of the existing online testing systems provide support for only completely “online” exams. In this paper, we describe our attempt to extend “Quiz” module in a popular learning management system “Moodle” to support offline objective-type assessments. Support for such offline assessments in an online tool introduces its own challenges such as generating variants of question papers from one master question paper to reduce cheating, converting the papers in a printable format; diagnostics of uploaded answersheets data to detect syntactic errors, facility to correct any incorrect information in the answer-sheet – such as incomplete student id, duplicate student id, etc; maintaining various versions of the answersheet; post quiz analysis of questions in the master question paper; facility for faculty to suggest certain changes as per the analysis such as cancelling a question, including an alternate answer, etc; ensuring changes in the master question paper is reflected in all variants; reprocessing the results with the updated question paper data, etc. We look at these concerns in detail and describe how our extension to Moodle addresses these concerns.
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I.
INTRODUCTION
O
BJECTIVE type tests are commonly used for competitive exams, pre-recruitment tests, certification exams, entrance exams, etc. Such exams generally have large number of candidates appearing and require the results to be published fast. Hence there is a preference for objective type tests. Objective type tests mostly consist of Multiple Choice questions (MCQs). Other variations of Objective type tests are fill-inthe-blanks, true-false, and matching items [1]. In this paper, we will restrict our discussion to Objective type tests containing MCQs only. MCQs are easier to guess and easy to cheat since answering such question consists of just selecting one of the given options and thus students can copy each other’s answers [3]. To reduce these attempts of cheating, sometimes different variants of question paper are generated, each containing same questions but scrambled. Another issue in MCQs is chances of ambiguity in the question paper or the answer options. The analysis post evaluation can be useful to address this concern. This analysis is generally done by analyzing the responses of the top scoring/all students for a question to the respective correct option. The analysis can be used to detect errors/ambiguities if any in the question paper (question text, answer options) [2] and accordingly corrective actions can be carried out to fix the ambiguities so that the students are not penalized due to error in the question paper. Modes of Conduction Such tests are usually conducted in one of two ways. In mode 1, what we can call online mode, a paper is set online, students are shown the questions on the computer and answers are marked in the computer. In mode 2, a computer system may be used for setting a paper and computing marks, but students mark their answers on paper – usually an Optical Mark Recognition (OMR) sheet – based on a hard copy of question paper. We use the term offline to denote this mode.
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Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments
In online mode, the student has to login to the testing software using a terminal or web browser and answer questions on the computer directly. Most of the tools facilitate auto-evaluation of objective type tests and hence it is possible to declare the results and feedback immediately. After the tests are scored, the data can be updated/downloaded into an electronic grade book. Online testing also eliminates the need of material infrastructure such as question paper, answer sheets, printing and transportation, etc. Conducting an exam in online mode introduces some challenges which cannot be overlooked [4]. A competitive exam, for example, typically has hundreds of students giving the exam together. However many organizations do not have infrastructure and required technical support to conduct the exams online for hundreds of students at once. In online testing, though the exam can be conducted online, it needs to be done under supervision to avoid unauthorized access and cheating. The security mechanism needs to be robust enough so as to avoid intrusions, unauthorized access, avoid loss of data, hacking of the system, etc. Similarly the system also requires a good recovery mechanism to ensure proper recovery of the system incase of network or browser crash during the examination. We also need good network connectivity for online tests. Because of these issues, most of the organizations prefer to conduct exams in an offline mode. OMR-based exams [5] facilitate getting exam data in electronic format for further processing and hence appear to be a good option for reducing the time and effort in offline exams. OMR-based exams, however, have low tolerance level of student mistakes such as improper/missing ovalling. It fails to read improperly ovalled entries, this can result in erroneous exam data. The question paper also needs to be prepared taking into account the structure of OMR sheet or OMR sheet needs to be in sync with the structure of exam and question paper. If its concerns are addressed and the concepts of online testing such as auto-evaluation, question banking, etc can also be brought in – ELELTECH INDIA 2009
this together can definitely lead to increase in the efficiency and reliability of the tasks involved in offline testing. Essentially we are looking out for an online tool which can bring in best from both of the worlds (offline testing and online testing) for managing offline exams. That is, the tool must have features supported by online testing tools and should also address the concerns of OMRbased testing. In the next section we will study some existing tools which provide support for online/offline exams. We evaluate these tools against our requirements and subsequently arrive at our proposed system. Section III discusses our approach to implement the proposed system as an extension to a popular LMS, Moodle and also looks at the implementation aspects. Section IV talks about the current status and looks at future directions.
II.
Online tests
support
for
offline
Requirements Based on need identified in the previous section, we are looking for an online tool which will fulfill basic requirements of an exam conducted in offline mode such as creating/managing questions; creating/managing question paper; converting question paper in a printable format; processing of scanned OMR data - to detect and rectify errors in scanned OMR data due to improper ovalling and to do result processing as per the question paper and keys; facility for post evaluation analysis of questions/question paper; maintaining results in grade book, etc. We will now evaluate some existing tools against our requirements. Existing tools
Many tools are available that provide support for managing and conducting Online Tests [6]. These tools are either independent testing tools such as Veda [7], Zoho Challenge [8] or are part of assessment mechanism in a Learning Management System (LMS) such as Moodle [9], ATutor, etc. These tools provide various facilities that increase the efficiency
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Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments
of managing and conducting the tests online. The effort and time required for evaluation is substantially reduced as these tools automatically evaluate objective type questions. Also these tools have advanced reporting and analysis mechanisms which provide useful statistics of the result data post evaluation. Some tools also have the facility to shuffle questions of a quiz – this can reduce the attempts of cheating in an online test. Most of the available tools, however, do not have a support for offline exams. Moodle [9], has an option for offline assignment and also provides other rich assessment features. Assignment Module [9] in Moodle, allows teachers to collect work from students, review it and provide feedback including grades. In “Offline” type of assignment the teacher has to provide only description and due date in Moodle. The actual conduction of the assignment as well as grading is done out side to Moodle. Later the grades and student specific feedback can be recorded in Moodle. However assignment module is focused on descriptive type questions only and does not have any support for maintaining questions/question bank independently and also post-evaluation analysis of question, question paper. There is no “offline” option in Moodle “Quiz” module which handles Objective type tests. There is lot of online support available for managing OMR-based exams. Most of the support is available in form of services provided by different vendors [10] [11] [12]. These vendors offer services such as creation of custom OMR sheet, scanning of the OMR answer sheets after the examination, processing of this scanned data to obtain results, generating specific reports from the result data, etc. Apart from services, there are also downloadable software such as Remark Classic OMR [13] and Vision OMR Software [14] available for handling the OMRexam related tasks. Observations The Online Testing tools available today are focused on online tests only. There is no testing tool/LMS known so far which has support for OMR-based exams as outlined in the sub-section II.A. ELELTECH INDIA 2009
In such a scenario, one option to exploit benefits of testing tools as well as OMR-based systems would be to integrate both. For integration we will require source code of both the tools to be available with us. While we have lot of open source testing tools and LMSes, OMR-based tools/services are still proprietary and closed source. Taking in to account the limitations of the existing testing tools and OMR-based tools we have built a system to provide online support for objective-type exams conducted offline (OMR-based exams). The tool will extend an existing open source testing tool to support OMR-based exams and will also address the issues in OMR-based exams such as answer sheet data error detection and rectification. As of now, we have chosen the extension to be based on the format of exams conducted for C-DAC Mumbai’s diploma programme [15]. Further, the testing tool chosen for extension is popular LMS Moodle [9]. Why Moodle Moodle is an open source, easy to extend and customize, Learning Management System. Along with comprehensive online documentation, there is lot of support available from the active online community regarding using/customizing/extending Moodle. “Quiz” module in Moodle, which is focused on objective type tests seems appropriate for our requirements. It provides rich features such as question banking, import/export questions, shuffling of questions, “Item analysis” and Report generation, post evaluation which can be used for offline tests too. Also Moodle is already used in our diploma programs, so the faculty and students of our diploma program are already familiar with it. This extension will result in reduced time and effort as well as increase reliability of all the tasks involved in managing OMR-based exams. Also since there is no support for offline exams (objective) in Moodle, this extension will be useful contribution to the Moodle community as well.
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Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments
III.
Our approach
As mentioned in the previous section the format of the system is based on our diploma program. In this section we will first discuss the structure of our diploma program exams, accordingly arrive at the exact requirements and then discuss the methodology adopted for extending Moodle to support these requirements. Scope Structure and Processing tasks of our OMRbased exams Our course quizzes are objective type tests consisting of multiple choice questions (single correct answer). These are conducted in a proctored environment on OMR sheets. The OMR sheet and the paper pattern (number of questions, number of options, student information required, etc) are in synchronization with each other. Variants of question paper (booklets) are created manually to avoid attempts of cheating. Each booklet is associated with a unique id. After the exams, the OMR sheets are scanned with a specialized scanner to obtain the answer sheet data in an electronic format. In the scanned file, each record holds data of a specific OMR sheet such as name, student id, booklet id, and answer string. This scanned data is analyzed to detect any errors such as invalid or missing bookletid/student-id, duplicate ids, etc due to improper ovalling in the OMR sheet. After initial evaluation, analysis of results is done to detect errors/ambiguities in question/question paper. If required, corrective actions are taken post-analysis. These corrective actions include cancelling an ambiguous question or providing one or more alternate answer for a question. Thus the entire processing of scanned OMR data comprises - detect and fix errors (if any) in scanned OMR data, evaluation of answer sheets, analysis of results and updating of result in student database. The existing setup for handling the processing tasks is quite time and resource consuming as these tasks are handled by separate teams using separate legacy systems. Generating variants is done ELELTECH INDIA 2009
manually and hence is tedious to create/update all variants of the question paper, especially when there are any changes in the master question paper. Requirements in detail Considering the structure and stages of result processing in our exam - we arrive at a set of requirements to be fulfilled by the extension to Moodle quiz to support our OMRbased exams. The extension in Moodle “Quiz” should allow the faculty to: – Maintain questions in the question bank – Create master question paper using the questions in the question bank – Generate variants (booklets) of the question paper i.e. shuffled versions of the same master question paper, each associated with a unique Booklet id. – Variants to be available in printable format – Upload configuration of the OMR sheet to Moodle – such as position and length of booklet id, position and length of answer string, etc. – Upload the scanned OMR (containing the student answer strings) file to Moodle – Moodle to retrieve appropriate data from the scanned OMR files as per the configuration information. – Perform analysis of the scanned OMR file to diagnose errors in answersheets such as duplicate ids, missing booklet ids, missing student ids, etc. – The errors (if any) should be displayed. – Facility to update the answer sheet data by rectifying errors (if any). – Analysis of exam data to detect ambiguities (if any) in the question paper – Perform corrective actions on the master question paper (if required) – – Cancel a question or Provide alternate answer
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Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments
Reprocessing for all the variants if Answer sheet data changes, OMR configuration changes, master question paper changes, etc – Publish the results - Student grade book to be displayed only when results are published The requirements are illustrated in Figure 1. Apart from the above requirements, one significant requirement is that relevant facilities available to online version of the Moodle Quiz should be present in this proposed “Offline” version too. –
Challenges in Requirements We can observe some challenges in the requirements that we just derived from our needs. Rectification of errors in answer sheet data would require handling multiple versions of answer sheet data. The processing of results needs to be done only for valid answer sheet records (valid students, valid booklet ids, etc), else it will lead to erroneous results. Before the corrective actions are done there should be some provision to store the original question/question paper as well. Similarly reprocessing of results would be required when there is any change in the answer sheet data, OMR configuration changes or any corrective actions have been performed on the original question paper. This would result in multiple versions of student result data. Last but not the least is the requirements which need all the facility of Moodle Online Quiz to be available for the Offline version too. The next subsection
discusses the methodology for adapting these requirements in Moodle quiz and also looks at how the above mentioned concerns are addressed in our system.
Methodology for Extension To decide on the methodology for the extension, we first studied how Moodle handles processing of online quizzes. In an online quiz, when a student submits a quiz, Moodle processes that attempt data using the quiz questions from the question bank. This processing phase evaluates each question, does the mark calculation and scaling (if required) and updates the student grade book. It also performs analysis on student data to obtain sophisticated item analysis and also generates various reports on demand. Online student attempt data and questions in the quiz are required as input in this phase. Considering this scenario, our methodology for extension is to introduce some mechanism to feed in the offline attempt data to the processing phase of Moodle. If we are able to do that, the processing phase will take care of doing rest of the activities such as Item Analysis, Updating in grade book, etc. So, essentially, after the processing is done, there will not be any difference between the student exam data – whether the student has attempted it online or has attempted it offline. The methodology for extension is illustrated in Figure 2.
Online Quiz
Scanned OMR data
Question Bank
OMR configuration
Question Paper
Requirements Generate Variants
Online attempt data
Paper Variants
Offline Attempt data
Paper Variants
Master QP
OMR Config
Analysis & Rectification of OMR Data
Process Results
Scanned OMR Data
Corrected OMR Data grade book
Item analysis
Reports
Processing of OMR Data Publish Results Analysis of Results Require updates
Corrective Actions
No
P art of Moodle
Fig. 2. Approach to extend Moodle to support offline assessments
Yes
Fig. 1. Requirements
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Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments
Requirement Mapping Now that the requirements and methodology is clear, we now focus on how this requirements and methodology can be built on top of Moodle Quiz. We analyzed each requirement to check – Which part of Moodle Quiz can be reused or adapted for that requirement. Requirements, which did not have a suitable match to Moodle Quiz functionality, are built from scratch. This mapping between our requirements and Moodle Quiz functionality is listed in Table 1. The next sections throw light on how various requirements are adapted in Moodle’s Quiz module. Table. 1. Requirement Mapping Requirement
Reuse
Maintain the questions in Moodle
YES
Prepare the master question paper
YES
Adapt
Generate variants of the master question paper
Build from Scratch
YES
YES (manual)
Shuffling questions in variants
YES (automatic)
All variants available in printable format
YES
Upload OMR configuration
YES
Upload answer sheet data i.e. the scanned OMR data files
YES
Diagnosis of answer sheet data
YES
Process the results
YES
Re-upload of Answer sheet Data
YES
Analysis Post-Evaluation
YES
Corrective Actions as per post-evaluation analysis
YES
Reprocess of results after corrective actions
YES
Moodle Quiz Adaptation Quiz is extended to support another type of exam –i.e. offline, OMR-based exam. The name of this new quiz type is “OMR”. “OMR” type of quiz inherits all the functionality of Online version of the quiz and provides additional OMR-specific functionality such as uploading OMR configuration, generating/maintaining variants of the question paper available in printable format, upload of answer sheet data, processing of results and publishing of results. While creating the quiz, the parameters that
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require being set are “opening of the quiz” and “Time limit”. The opening time and date and time limit is displayed on each variant in printable format. Rest of the parameters can be default. The adaptation of this parameters is also consistent with the interpretation and impact of these parameters in “Online” Quiz. Considering the interpretation of these parameters in Online quiz, the attempt data can be uploaded in Quiz and processing of the quiz can be done only after the opening quiz date and time, respectively. Configuring OMR Parameters OMR parameters such as answer-string position, booklet position, student roll number position, etc are uploaded as a text file. This helps the processing functionality of Moodle to retrieve relevant information from the uploaded scanned OMR files. It also facilitates the OMR structure to be flexible. If the OMR sheet structure is changed, relevant parameters in OMR configuration file can be updated. Question Paper Variant generation Given the number of variants, booklet ids for the variants can be entered manually or generated automatically. Care is taken to ensure that variant ids are unique across Moodle to avoid clashes in answer sheet data across quizzes. The shuffling of questions can be done automatically or manually (using Moodle’s inbuilt reordering tool). The shuffled version of the question paper includes the original question ids in a shuffled order. This ensures that any change in the master question paper/questions is reflected in all the variants. All the variants are also available in printable format. All this saves faculty effort to do these tasks manually. If a question is added to question paper post variant generation, this question is appended at the end of the question list in every variant. If required, the faculty can do further shuffling.
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Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments
Uploading the Offline Answer Data OMR scanned data files can be uploaded in Moodle for further processing. Relevant information from each record is retrieved as per the OMR configuration information. First each record is scanned to detect errors due to improper ovalling and the respective errors are displayed either error category wise or record wise. For rectification of errors, the faculty is expected to make changes in the answer sheet data file as per the diagnostic information and accordingly re-upload the answer sheet data. When the faculty uploads updated answer sheet data, all the previous data is cleaned and substituted with the newly uploaded data. Processing and Publishing of Results As per the requirement, the results are processed only for valid records (valid student ids, valid booklet ids, etc). Moodle process functionality is adapted to do the processing. As mentioned before the offline attempt data i.e. the scanned OMR data is provided as an input to the processing functionality. This ensures the processing of the results and the corresponding updates in Moodle are done as in case of an Online “Quiz”. However, result changes in the grade book are not visible to the student after initial processing of results. The result changes will be visible to the student in the grade book only after explicit “Publishing” of results. This is to allow faculty to review performance statistics and make modifications as shown in next sub section. Analysis of Results After the initial processing of results, Moodle’s inbuilt “Item Analysis” can be used by the faculty to identify ambiguities (if any) in the question paper. In Moodle’s Item analysis, statistical parameters used are calculated as explained by classical test theory [16]. Among the various statistical parameters available, “%R” can be used to detect ambiguities /error in a particular question. “%R” denotes the number of students that opted for the correct option. So if majority of students select an option other ELELTECH INDIA 2009
than the correct action - the question is ambiguous OR there are more than one correct answers for this question OR there might be some error in setting correct answer in master question paper. Corrective Actions The faculty can check the analysis and as per the values of various parameters in the Item analysis table, take appropriate corrective actions. For cancelling a question – zero credit can be given to the question in the master question paper or full credit can be given to all options in the question in the master question paper. For including an alternate answer for a question, full or partial credit can be given to respective alternate answer in the master question paper. Moodle already support all this manipulation at question level. Whenever corrective actions are applied on a specific question, the original question gets changed. However all the corrective actions applied to that question are stored along with that specific question, for that particular quiz, for further reference. Reprocessing Reprocessing of results is required when answer sheet data is re-uploaded or variants are changed or OMR configuration is changed or Corrective Actions are performed on the question paper, etc. The reprocessing policy we have adopted is - Clean old data and process freshly with the new data. Implementation Moodle is modular in structure and all the files related to Moodle “Quiz” are organized in a separate “Quiz” module folder. Most of additions/modifications done for this extension are limited to this folder only. Various conventions are followed to ensure version compatibility. Available global variables are used to retrieve user information, get data base connection, etc. Similarly Moodle coding guidelines are followed. Wherever required Moodle’s library functions are used for accessing database, etc. Currently the interface of this extension
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Extending Moodle to Support Offline Assessments
is available in English language only but it can be localized later as the content of the interface is stored and manipulated in form of language strings.
IV.
Current Status and Future work
The requirements have been implemented till the stage of publishing of results. We are currently testing the system with actual OMR exam data. Once the testing phase is completed, we are planning to release the beta version for evaluation by Moodle community. After the evaluation phase, we will contribute it to the Modules and Plug-ins in Moodle. We are also planning to send it for evaluation to potential users such as educational organization, corporate which are already using Moodle. While the implemented system is useful, it can still be extended to make it more extensive to support offline objective-type exam. Some of further work includes – supporting complex OMR formats, support for multiple correct options in MCQ, making the system available as a web service which can be integrated by any LMS, CMS, etc. Acknowledgments We would like to thank Moodle development team from OSSD Division for their valuable inputs during the implementation of the project.
[http://www.osra.org/2001/bartlett1.pd f] [5] OMR Technology [http://www.unescap.org/stat/popit/pop-guide/capture_ch05.pdf] [6] Directory of E-Learning Tools: Quizzing and Testing Tools [[http://www.c4lpt.co.uk/Directory/Tool s/testing.html] [7] Veda - an Online Testing & Question Banking System [http://www.cdacmumbai.in/veda] [8] Zoho Challenge: Conducts tests online [http://zohochallenge.com/] [9] Moodle [http://moodle.org] [10]OMR solutions [www.omrsolutions.com/ ] [11]OMR.in [http://www.omr.in/] [12]OMR Home [www.omrhome.com/] [13]Remark Classic OMR [http://www.gravic.com/remark/classico mr/] [14]Vision OMR Software [http://www.alibaba.com/productfree/240624809/Vision_OMR_software.ht ml] [15]C-DAC Mumbai’s student portal [http://education.cdacmumbai.in] Moodle Item Analysis theoretical background [http://docs.moodle.org/en/Item_analysis_t heoretical_background]
REFERENCES [1] Objective Tests [http://www.polyu.edu.hk/obe/GuideOB E/objective_tests.pdf] [2] “Multiple-Choice Test Item Analysis: A New Look at the Basics” D. G. Hamill and P. D. Usala, [http://www.ipacweb.org/conf/02/hamil l.pdf] [3] Multiple Choice Questions [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_c hoice] [4] A Comparison of Online and Traditional Testing Methods in an Undergraduate Business Information Technology Course
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E- Evaluation for Visually Challenged Students
E- Evaluation for Visually Challenged Students Abstract: M. Dhanalakshmi Y. Laxminarayana
The aim of the paper is to present an Eevaluation model for the evaluation of visually challenged students/candidates for the screening tests conducted by the different examining authorities. The major attempt is made to avoid the use of a scriber by the candidate and make him take the exam independently. The paper describes functioning of the model of EEvaluation and its advantages.
Keywords:
E-evaluation, Visually challenged People, Objective type exam, keyboard Electronic learning (or e-Learning) is a type of Technology supported education/learning where the medium of instruction is through computer technology. E-evaluation is an inherent part of e-learning and evaluation is a process to qualify a candidate. E-learning is benefiting the sections of the society hitherto that was very difficult to make learning in those sections like People from rural areas, Working personal, Physically challenged etc.. One of those sections of the society is Visually Challenged People (VCP). This paper gives a new approach for the Eevaluation of the visually challenged people which can be compared to be on par with other general candidates. The scenario of the VCP is as: - In India as per the 2001 census, 10.635 million people (about 1%) are visually impaired, i.e., one in every hundred. It is an inhumane if such a large chunk of population is denied the chances and rights on par with others. Most of them are not opting for higher education and thus for good jobs because of the obstacles in learning, qualifying and also related problems in writing exams. Some Universities does not take the visually impaired at all, while some are giving them admissions with a limited option of subjects.
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40
E- Evaluation for Visually Challenged Students
Most of the reasons as told by them are the problems involved in evaluation & teaching. Even when VCPs get qualified in the University exams, next problem they face is the hurdle of screening tests or competitive exams conducted for the jobs by different recruiting agencies like Union and State PSCs, Companies, Boards etc. One of the job recruiting agencies prescribes the rules for VCPs as: 1) the candidate has to arrange his/her own scribe/writer at his/her own cost. 2) The scribe/writer must be in one grade junior in academic qualification to the candidate. 3) Scribe/writer should be one possessing 50% or less marks. 4) He should be from an academic discipline other than that of the candidate. 5) Both candidate and scriber will have to give a suitable undertaking conforming that the scribe fulfils all the stipulated eligibility criteria. 6) They will be given 20 minutes extra for every one hour of the exams. These rules show us the difficulties faced by a VCP candidate. In this technological age where a number of e-gadgets are available and software has penetrated in to every nook & corner of our life, the methods of E-learning and E-evaluation can be used to reduce the hurdles of the VSP candidate. This paper gives a model where in it explains how a VCP can take a screening test using Egadgets and without any scriber’s help. In this model of E-evaluation for VCPs, the gadgets required are a computer with a keyboard, an earphone and a CD/storage devise (with software and question paper). The candidate undergoing exam is to use these gadgets during exam. This model is aimed at the objective type exams that are most common for the screening tests. The algorithm that is to be followed by the program software is presented in this paper that explains how a VCP takes an exam and how the evaluation is carried out without the help of any other person. The components of this model are :- a) a computer with program software and question paper and answer sheet in the CD,
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b) Earphones, c)Visually Challenged candidate taking the exam and d) Keyboard
Picture-1 Computer This is the platform on which the exam/screening test is held. It is a general configuration PC with a CPU, monitor, keyboard, CD player with read/write facility, earphone facility etc. This type of computer setup is now a common hardware in any college/examining centre. Keyboard This is a single way interface between the software and the candidate by which VCP answers and controls the question paper. Only a small portion (right side of the board) of the ordinary computer keyboard is to be used by the candidate. The keys of this portion of the keyboard are to be pasted with symbols as shown in the picture2 below. On practice even this may not be required by the candidate. The functions of the symbols/keys are explained in below table. There is a thought of developing a special keyboard but that is not discussed here.
Picture-2
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E- Evaluation for Visually Challenged Students
Symbol
Function
A ,B, C, D 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 . ↑ , ↓ , → ,← « , » R X CH
answers for the Question Question No or other any No Enter to go next or whenever called for previous or next Question For previous or next section For repeating the question For canceling the answer Check the already answered question
E
End
Earphones This is also a single way interface between the software and the candidate by which VCP hears the instructions and questions from the CD/Question paper.
password protected read-write device and two passwords are required to open it. One password to be entered by the examiner / invigilator and the other by the candidate .Candidates password can be given in hall ticket.
C.D./Storage device This is the storage devise in a similar way to a question paper and answer sheet to a normal candidate. This also contains the program software to run the exam and instructions to the candidate. This is a
Algorithm of the software This software uses the text reading software as a subroutine. Texts reading software is now-a-days became common and are used in many fields. The program software designed for our purpose reads the
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E- Evaluation for Visually Challenged Students
instructions and questions for the candidate. It takes the commands from the keyboard and operates the next function (i.e. marks/changes the answer sheet and reads the next question / message) as described in below algorithm. The answer sheet gets
Course of exam Before the exam starts, there will be some pre exam work, in most of the cases it involves: filling of hall ticket no, writing of name of exam, year, paper code etc. But in this case there will be only entry of Passwords. The CD comes with all the information filled in application. As the CD is ELELTECH INDIA 2009
updated on the entering of keys-A,B,C or D. End of every question or instruction reading waits for a command from keyboard and every entry from keyboard results in reading of next question / instruction.
inserted in the computer, it auto plays the program. In this CD, time is already set and the invigilator reads out the time to the candidate after entering his password. Then the candidate enters his/her password. Before the actual start of exams, the instructions and the details of the question paper are read by the
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E- Evaluation for Visually Challenged Students
computer and the candidate hears it though the earphones. At the exact time, exam starts with the reading of Question no-1. The candidate starts answering using the keyboard and the answer sheet in the CD gets updated as shown in the algorithm. The exam ends automatically with the lapse of time as the time period is already set in the program. The Program automatically closes the CD with the end of the exam. Evaluation of the paper The CD can be read /opened with a secured password for the evaluation purpose 1) Evaluation can be done by getting the QA sheet printed and then corrected in the normal procedure or 2) From this CD, taking a softcopy of the QA sheet and giving this to the evaluation computer directly and getting the result Advantages of this model This system of evaluation of a VCP has many advantages over other existing systems of evaluation. They are: 1) It uses the existing computer hardware facilities at the examination center. Only ear phones and CDs are to be supplied by the Examining / recruiting agencies. 2) No scribe is required. So there is a total confidence on a candidate’s Performance and evaluation 3) No external help for candidate makes him independent like normal candidate. The burden of getting the proper scribe is removed for the candidate. 4) Candidate can practice this model if he/she is given a model CD with the issue of hall ticket and he/she can learn with least difficulty as number of gadgets is few. 5) Due to the use of limited no of keys and that to a particular part of the keyboard, this model is user friendly. 6) It is language independent; an objective type test in any language can be conducted for the VCP, provided the text reading software is available in that language.
2) This can be made practiced in VCP rehabilitation centers, colleges, etc. to get accustomed. 3) A practice CD to be issued by examining/recruiting agency with the issue of hall ticket 4) Whether extra time to be given in this model can be decided by an expert committee involving VCP. 5) An efficient text reading softwares to be selected.
Conclusion An attempt is made to use the generally available e-gadgets and the software technology to make a Visually Challenged Candidate to take an Objective type test without the help of a scriber/writer. Further attempts are to be made to realize software and make a sample survey to tune the program for its effectiveness. References 1. Proceedings of International seminar on empowering Visually Impaired through ICT, April 15-16-2009 2. Application details for the post of probationary officer in State bank of India. 3. Supreme Court directions to Govt. of India in various cases like Dhawal Vs. Union of India, Amita vs. Rajiv Yaduvanshi, Anshul kapoor vs. Union of India, Parminder pal singh vs. Union of India etc. 4. News paper clippings:- Times of India18may 2009, Expess News service 15 may 2009, IANS 8 march 2008, 5. G.O. Rt.No.209 of Govt. of AP dated 0907-2008 6. ‘E-learning and E-evaluation: A case study’ by Lorentz Jantschi and others 7. ‘Position Paper: use of extended time’ by Carol Allman 8. Census of India-2001
Actions required for better results 1) This model is to be practiced by the candidate before exam
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Interactive Learning Environments for Mathematics
Interactive Learning Mathematics
Environments
for
Abstract:
Akshay Kumar C-DAC Mumbai Mr. Akshay Kumar is a Staff Scientist in Educational Technology unit of C-DAC Mumbai. His research interests include Content Design, Learning Management Systems, Constructive Learning Environments and Teaching Methodologies.
Archana Rane C-DAC Mumbai Ms. Archana Rane is a Senior Staff Scientist in Educational Technology unit of C-DAC Mumbai. Her research interests include Assessment Technologies, Learning Management Systems, Constructive Learning Environments and Language Tutoring.
Dr M Sasikumar C-DAC Mumbai Dr M Sasikumar has been with CDAC Mumbai for over 20 years, and currently heads its Artificial Intelligence, Educational Technology, Open Source Software, Language Computing and Computer Graphics divisions. ELELTECH INDIA 2009
Mathphobia restrict learners in solving mathematical problems. It is primarily due to requirement of application level (Bloom's Taxonomy [1]) of understanding of a concept in mathematics. In traditional environment of teaching learning process, making all learners to get application level of understanding is difficult. In this paper, we report two systems built using different approaches of e-education which attempts to tackle individual learning needs for Mathematics. “STEPMAT” is a constructivist learning environment which attempts to bring the aspects of personalised tutoring for learning to solve two variable linear algebraic equations. “BLOCKMAT” is a game environment which attempts to bring the aspects of motivation, challenge and emotions inherent in the process of playing and as a by-product learner gets to memorise various types of trigonometrical identities.
INTRODUCTION The new educational paradigm emphasizes learner oriented education in place of the traditional teacher oriented education. Learner dictates by making their choice to receive particular learning events. Now, on-line delivery of content should not only possess the properties of “any pace”, “any time” and “any place” learning but it can also enhance learning by providing another dimension of it as “ANY WAY”. “ANY WAY” learning can be referred to those learning environments which are mainly driven by learner's interaction that defines the structure, form and presentation of the learning events. Learning mathematics is difficult for many students, due to various reasons such as requiring at least application level [3] of understanding as per Bloom's taxonomy. So, a learner should be able to recall facts
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Interactive Learning Environments for Mathematics
(knowledge level), understand information (comprehension level) and use information in a new situation (application level). It may require higher level of skills if learner wants to solve new problem. Mathematics is a high scoring subject. If a learner is able to solve a problem, he/she gets full marks and if unable to solve he/she gets zero marks. Although, partial credit is common in practice, it does not help a learner with poor mathematical skill, due to tight dependency between steps of a solution. If a learner does not know early steps of solution, he/she can not go beyond that step. In a classroom environment, one can find substantial difference of marks in Mathematics (compared to other subjects) among learners having different level of skill. These differences create more peer pressure compared to other subjects and thus, that hinders the normal way and/or pace of learning of an individual learner. As Mathematics requires much higher learning skill, making all learners to get uniform level of understanding is very difficult. There is no immediate feedback available in traditional classroom environment. Use of negative comments can restrict students from clarifying doubts in classrooms. It becomes almost impossible if teacher-student ratio increases beyond a limit and it becomes worst in a class of candidates with varied intelligence. The above mentioned aspects has great importance in Mathematics learning where learners have to prove themselves that they
understand the problem and can solve by comprehending the solution. So, making system that helps in Mathematics learning has inherent issues and challenges. We discuss some of them in this paper along with some solutions. We need to find approaches to make mathematics learning attractive and deep. In this paper, we discuss two systems. One system helps at knowledge level of understanding and other one helps in comprehension and application level of understanding. These systems respectively use constructivist learning environment (based on constructivist theory [2] of learning) and gaming environment. We find these two approached effective in addressing the depth of learning and holding learner interest issues. We discuss Constructivism and Mathematics learning along one of our system STEPMAT (a constructivist learning environment) in second section, game and Mathematics learning along with our system BLOCKMAT (a gaming environment in third section. In fourth section, we discuss conclusions and future plans.
CONSTRUCTIVISM AND MATHEMATICAL LEARNING Constructivist [6] approach of learning can be stated as follow: Each learner creates unique meaning based on their experiences. Learner's mind filters input of external stimuli and assimilate it as his/her own version of reality. Learning can be
Fig 1: Main screen of STEPMAT
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Interactive Learning Environments for Mathematics
viewed as search for meaning of external stimuli in the existing model of reality inside learner's mind. Some constructive learning environments for domains are discussed in [7] like Archarya [8], Marathi-Tutor [9]. [10] discuss about constructivist approach to teach sentences of Indian languages. The constructivism learning environment is effective in advance knowledge acquisition which is implicit part in Mathematics learning. As we know, Mathematics requires some input from learner to get into next step towards solution. This arise a need of input of external stimuli (previous step of the solution) and output as next step of solution. If learner is able to proceed towards solution he/she gets the solutions. But whether a step is going towards a solution or not is also determined by the learner perspective of viewing partial solution to complete solution. Thus we can see that the constructivist approach of learning mathematics has great potential. Additionally, there are many variations to solve a particular equation. System should not restrict learner to solve problem in a very restricted path. Learner should able to choose any path that leads to valid solution the problems. One of our solutions “STEPMAT” tries to create a constructivist learning environment to learn Mathematics to keeping these issues in consideration. “STEPMAT” is an intelligent tutor [4] for learning to solve two variable linear algebraic equations. It serves following purposes: it teaches a concept (solving linear equation); it provides suitable practice problems for the concept taught and it provides step-by-step guidance during student's working. Overall System According to selected difficulty option, learner gets a pair of algebraic equations. These algebraic equations are to be solved by learner. Initially, learner can give direct answer of the problem. If learner gives right answer, systems asks next question, otherwise learner has to attempt the problem in detail with step-by-step. But, learner can write steps in different way and system would not able to evaluate them. So, the system has predefined tasks and subtask ELELTECH INDIA 2009
and learner has to select appropriate task/subtask with minimal extra input while working of solving an equation. This helps system to evaluate learner more efficiently. This also gives learners to solve the problem without restricting to a particular solution. For example: For a given equations: 2x+3y=13; 3x+2y=12 Task: Eliminate variable y by LCM Method Subtask: LCM of coefficient of variable y Step: 6 Notebook output: For eliminating variable y by LCM, we take LCM of coefficient of variable y and it is LCM (3, 2) =6 As given in above example, we can arrive at solution of the given pair of equations by performing a sequence of tasks and subtasks. Before performing any task, a drop down list of available tasks is presented to learner. Learner selects task and then subtask. The subtask also requires steps as learner input. The chosen task, subtasks and input step is displayed to the learner's solution area like exercise note book. In case, learner selects an invalid task or subtask, system displays appropriate constructive feedback like “one can not substitute before finding a value of a variable”. We can perceive system guides in an innovative way and support learner for getting solutions by choosing rather than writing. A novice learner also has facility of selecting 'Don't know' option in the task or subtask list. The system performs appropriate tasks and subtasks on the behalf of learner in the case of selecting 'Don't Know' option. At this stage, comments are generated to enable the learner to note which task has been chosen by the system. Difference between choosing 'Don't Know' option at task and subtask level is as follows: for task selection, system does a complete task of the solution on behalf of user and for subtask level selection; system does only a subtask of the solution.
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Interactive Learning Environments for Mathematics
System's feedback System's feedback is generated on the basis of nature of step entered by the learner. Nature of step can be of one of the four categories- (a) learner may enter a wrong step. (b) Learner may enter the right step but not in an expected format of the system. (c) Learner may skip some steps and write steps which are further down in the execution path. (d) Learner may enter the step as expected. We can summarise the nature of feedback in the Table 1 below: TABLE 1: FEEDBACK OF THE SYSTEM ON STUDENT'S STEP
Nat ure of Ste p
Student Step
Expected step
Feedback
(a)
3x+5=10
3x+2=10
Your term “+5” should be “+2”
(b)
5=x
x=5
Correct, we arrange it as x=5
(c)
x=3
5x=10+5
Excellent(has merged steps)
(d)
2x=8-2
2x=8-2
Good
Problem generation strategy System generate problem in three levels of difficulty- 'Simple', 'Medium', and Difficult'. The difficulty levels of the problem are decided by the coefficient and solution set values of the two equations, as shown in Table 2. TABLE 2: DECISION TABLE OF DIFFICULTY LEVEL Coefficient values
Solution set values
Level
0-12
--
Simple
Composite number 14-50
--
Medium
Prime number -13 and above
Difficult
--
Small integer
Simple
--
fractions
Medium
--
Larger integers
Difficult
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GAMES AND MATHEMATICAL LEARNING Games always interest children [5]. They are helpful in gaining the attention and building the concentration of the player. Games are also helpful in developing interest and motivating the player by setting different implicit challenges like speed of game, complexity of game objects etc. These properties of game make it a potential candidate for using in education. Educational games are those games which help in learning. Learning may be motor skills, cognitive skills or psychological skills. Teaching motor skills by computer is not easy task. But how to click mouse, how to type efficiently are some of the learning which can be done effectively by computer games. Because, given input to game can be visualised as teaching of pressing appropriate key stroke in a specified time. But the cognitive skills are those skills which are hard to capture via computer games. It requires a lot of innovation while designing such type of games. Game inherently includes challenge and pace. A complex game generally become adaptive and copes with the speed of player and becomes interesting to all type of learner from slow to fast learner. This enhances the motivation of learner in the learning scenario. But, it is very difficult to put the learning component inside a game. Game should not be overwhelmed by the learning material, losing the meaning of game. But learning also should not be overwhelmed by the game and with no significant learning taking place. Learning should be implicit in game. This makes development of game based learning experience difficult. For most children, video games become their introduction to computer technology. Video games generally give instantaneous feedback in a context of goal oriented activities [1]. As we perceive, goal oriented activities are core strategy for solving mathematical problems. So, it seems appropriate to use games in the mathematics activity. “BLOCKMAT” is a gaming system which provides a generic framework for memorising formulas/expression, fulfilling
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Interactive Learning Environments for Mathematics
the requirement of lowest level of understanding in Bloom's Taxonomy. The system can be used for subjects which involve formation of expression e.g. trigonometrical identities, formulas of organic chemistry or arrangement of letters in a word game. This game may be treated as extension of normal tetris game. Tetris game is a game of falling blocks. Player of the game has to manipulate these blocks, by moving each one sideways and rotating it by 90 degree units, with the aim of creating a horizontal line of blocks without gaps. When such a line is created, it disappears and player gets points. As the game progresses, the blocks fall faster, and the game ends when the stack of blocks reaches the top of the playing field and no new blocks are able to enter. In “BLOCKMAT”, blocks are replaced by terms of the formulas or identities. The game involves arrangement of terms by the player such that a valid arrangement of formula is created. Once learner recognises the arranged valid formula by selecting a set of blocks in the game area, those selected blocks disappears and any block above the disappeared set of blocks fall to fill the gap. A screenshot of running game is shown in Fig 2. There are some rules for valid arrangement of terms to make a formula i.e. from bottom to top and left to right. So, if placed Sin A,=,P,/,H without gap in the
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game area from left to right, in the same order then it is valid arrangement of terms having formula Sin A=P/H. If Sin A, =, P, /, H is placed with gaps or other terms in between or scrambled, then it is not valid arrangement. It is also not compulsory for the player to first choose the starting term with which he/she is planning to make expression. For example, if expression to be formed is Sin A=P/H where Sin A, =, P, /, H are terms, in the horizontal direction, it does not matter in which manner the blocks are fallen, either Sin A fallen first or / or other terms. If there is some valid arrangement, player should be able to select them. It also helps learner to look ahead. Because, if learner is seeing that next token is / and current token is H and learner already placed Sin A, =. P in a valid manner then learner will leave a space after P and will place H. In next step, when current token becomes /, learner will able to get a valid formula to be selected. These above aspects of the game can be seen as “ANY WAY” part of elearning. The system helps students to memorise formulas or identities primarily by engaging the learner in the arranging terms in specific manner. Thus, learners are provided an environment where learner is provided with memorising terms without explicitly saying the same.
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Interactive Learning Environments for Mathematics
System stores expression in a file as a sequence of terms. For each difficulty level we have separate files. Changing these files will change the complexity of formula and domain. If we have sin2A, +,Cos2A, =, 1 as a
Gaming window is divided into two regions- top region consists of navigational button and lower region provides a rectangular playing area, where user arranges the tokens. Player has to place
Fig 2: Main playing area of BLOCKMAT
line in the stored file then it is game which helps in memorising trigonometrical equations. If we have H2O, +,Co2, =H2CO3 then it becomes a game which helps in memorising chemical equations.
System description The system comprises the following sections in the game viz., Best Score section, Game setting, tutorial (mainly about tokens and associated formula) and main playing area. Main playing area of the game has different menus and sections to be selected for the specific options and various running state of the game. “Best Score” section displays best scores including name and rank of the player/learner. Game setting provides the player with facility to customise main game window. Main gaming window is the area where the player plays with the blocks with captions indicating tokens of the relevant concept for example trigonometrical identities. Tutorial provides the learner with the overview of different formulas, which can be categorised on the basis of level.
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token at appropriate location by left or right key.
CONCLUSION AND FUTURE WORK In two systems, we explored the scope of individualised learning by matching learning pace with learning skill of the learner. These systems are helpful to students in different ways. “STEPMAT” helps student to learn the whole process of solving linear equation as a partial to whole solution. The system's step, subtask, task and solution area text are components of this process. “Don't Know” option can be seen as good pedagogical element for asking for help from system. So, learner having issue with comprehending the solution step-by-step and not seeing solution as a whole will certainly get help from this system. We are trying for finding out formulas to calculate the difficulty level of algebraic equations. As of now, we are checking only the value of coefficients and constants. We have to introduce the short cut solution as a learner does for some problems like x+y=5 and x+2y=8. A learner, who already learnt to solve the problem, has to only subtract one
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Interactive Learning Environments for Mathematics
equation from the other. This will lead to efficient solution for this particular problem. We can not do this in present system. We will also enhance the feedbacks of the system. As of now, only two levels of task have been implemented but we can have multiple level of task for complex problems. Whereas, “BLOCKMAT” tries to help in memorising the formulas which are building blocks of the problem of domains like trigonometry. This learning element is implicit in the game. So, learner having issue with memorising facts/formulas will certainly get help by this system. “BLCOKMAT” can be improved. We have to place database in place of flat files. Teacher should able to create database of domain and formula string for a particular class from system interface. At present, teacher has to create those domain files separately and has to place at appropriate location.
Design: Potential and Limitations. Educational Technology & Society, 8 (1), 1727 7.Constructive learning Environments. M Sasikumar. Invited paper at International workshop on e-learning for Adult Continuing Education, September 15-17, 2006, Cochin 8.Acharya: An Intelligent Tutoring environment for learning SQL. Sandhya Bhagat, Latesh Bhagat, Jojumon Kavalan, and M. Sasikumar. Proceedings of Vidyakash2002 - International conference on Online learning, Vikas publishing house, India. 9.Marathi-tutor. Archana Rane and M Sasikumar. Technical Report, CDAC Mumbai, 2006. Constructivist approach to teach sentences in Indian language. Abhijit Joshi and Sasikumar M. International conference on advances in computing , communications and control, Bandra, jan 23-24, 2009
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We would like to thank Ms. Sonali Bishnu Mallick, SNDT University, Mumbai, who built the STEPMAT prototype as her course project and Mr. Sachin chawla, Uttar Pradesh Technical University, Lucknow, who built the “BLOCKMAT” prototype as his course project. REFERENCES 1.Bloom B. S. (1956). Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, Handbook I: The Cognitive Domain. New York: David McKay Co Inc. 2.Constructivist theory (J. Bruner). [Online]. Available: http://www.gwu.edu/~tip/bruner.html 3.Bloom's Taxonomy. [On-line]. Available:: http://www.learningandteaching.info/learni ng/bloomtax.htm 4.Intelligent Tutoring System [On-line]. Available: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_tut oring_system 5.Computer Games as a Part of Children’s Culture( Johannes Fromme). [On-line]. Available: http://gamestudies.org/0301/fromme/ 6.Karagiorgi, Y., & Symeou, L. (2005). Translating Constructivism into Instructional ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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Case Studies of e-Learning implementations
Case Studies of e-Learning implementations
Mr. Alok Tiwari Infosys Technologies Alok Tiwari, in past 15 years, is involved in various assignments covering hardware, software development & Education Research. He is currently working as development center manager Education & Research at Pune development center executive council member. He is responsible for technology program & certifications roll out for the employees of Pune development center. Alok is involved in key organisational initiatives like Campus Connect (Industry - Academia collaboration), Technology Assisted Learning, etc.
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools Abstract:
Jhumpa Ghosh Ray NGO Change Initiatives Ms. Jhumpa Ghosh Ray is the director of the NGO Change Initiatives, which is into development research, education and livelihoods, with an emphasis on ICTs and gender issues. She is trained in Ethnographic Action Research. Ms Ghosh Ray is an M. Phil. from Calcutta University and a B.Ed. Her training in Ethnographic Action Research is from the researchers of London School of Economics and Queensland University.
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The paper is based on the author’s experience of installing an elearning device called Kyan in 65 state-run schools in rural Bengal. She noticed a marked qualitative shift towards the better after the start of the project but felt that much more needed to be done in terms of greater availability of elearning tools, teacher training and generation of content in the vernacular. Direct interventions are also necessary in the provision of PCs to the poor but meritorious students, while assured supply of stable electricity is a challenge. Index Terms—Content, education, ICTs, media
INTRODUCTION When we watch a movie or a theatre we “can recall them better than the contents of a story book. This is like the characters of the book acting on the wall. It is a great experience. Our interest in studies has grown.” — Palash Hajra, Class IX student, Khatundi High School, Burdwan “We read the chapter on ‘article’ before. But when didimoni (teacher) showed us the exercise, we found it great. We gave prompt answers to what we were asked after teaching. I wish I could join a school that has Kyan” — Sudeb Pal, Class V student, Sarenga Mission Junior School, Bankura In July 2007, the Bengal government initiated an elearning programme, under which state government-run schools in rural regions are getting a novel computer called Kyan that is loaded with study content based on the curriculum of the National Council on Education Research and Training. Kyan is a mobile computer with an inbuilt projector that removes the need for a monitor and allows contents to be shown on surfaces such as a large screen or a wall.
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
The joint developers of the instruction tool, IIT Mumbai and IL&FS Education Technology Services (IETS), built it to meet the needs of group learning. The developers believed other methods such as PC-based learning and connecting PCs to televisions with large screens are either inadequate or costly. Besides a mobile computer can facilitate learning on a “anytime, anywhere” basis. One of the Bengal government’s aim in the project is to reduce dropouts by making teaching exciting. The project is under a programme of Webel Technology Limited and is being supported by the Department of Information Technology of the Government of India and the information technology department of the Bengal government. Webel has mandated IETS to implement the project. The one-year programme started in two districts of Bengal — Bankura (25 schools) and Burdwan (40). Each of the schools has been provided with two Kyans, which have multimedia education content in English for classes V to X in Mathematics, Physical Science, Life Science, History, Geography and English. Contents in Bengali are there for classes VII to X in Physical Science and Life Science. The programme had started in July 2007, and the Kyans were installed in early September. Prior to their installation, IETS undertook pre-installation surveys, orientation programmes among headmasters and teacher’s training programmes. After the installation, there were four support visits at all the 65 schools and an impact assessment exercise at the end of the oneyear period. Our NGO, Change Initiatives, did two of the support visits and the impact assessment. In our support visits, we did a content mapping exercise and training in the open source platform. The content mapping involved linking the NCERT content with the syllabus of the Bengal board. While doing the impact assessment, we looked at the project from the perspective of students, teachers, the school authorities ELELTECH INDIA 2009
and the community (Slater, Tacchi). Accordingly, we formulated some questions to guide our work: • What was the impact of the project on students? — did Kyan improve attendance, reduce dropouts and improve exam results? • What was the impact of the projects on teachers — did the project address the need for teacher training? • What were the responses of the school authorities? Did they make any structural changes in their work to accommodate the device? How was sustainability addressed? • What was the impact of the project on the community? specifically the interest from other schools and the response of the parents. We did the study in over two months, doing in-depth interviews with the headmasters of 64 schools and holding about 15 group discussions with the students. We had to leave out one school in Bankura — Barikul — because the school did not have electricity. We have started the paper with an overview of Burdwan and Bankura and then have discussed two issues that are critical to the overall discussion: • Conceptualising elearning: Technology plays a key role in promoting a higher order of learning where instead of a one-way instruction from teachers to students the focus is on collaborative learning, with the focus being on creating an appropriate platform of interaction between the teacher and student. For this, technology needs to be backed by appropriate content, training of teachers and intergrating elearning to the ethos of the schools. • Description of Kyan: The device has all the attributes of a high-end computer, but as a group learning device, its USP is its in-built
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
projector that allows any hard surface such as a village wall to become a monitor, as well as its compact size that makes it portable and immune from wear and tear compared to alternative devices. Besides it can also run on alternative energy such as solar power. After this we have done the impact analysis, under the following themes: • Attendance: The project aims to reduce the dropout rate; an assessment of attendance after Kyan was required. Broadly, we saw great enthusiasm among students, with attendance improving on the days of Kyan classes. • Exam results: A new mode of teaching and learning should lead to a greater clarity and improved problem-solving capabilities, creating the desired impact on exam results. • Changes in school-curriculum: Given the limited availability of the device, the school authorities need to use it in a systematic fashion. Routines have to be prepared to ensure the most efficient use. • Trends from technology-aided learning (TAL) register: With the teachers adapting to a new style of instruction, it was necessary to have a log book — the TAL register — to ensure that the classes are taken properly. Such a register also provides interesting insight on the use of the device. • Sustainability: Issues of sustainability acknowledge the need for a strategy to generate financial resources so that the school is able to operate the device smoothly beyond the project period. • ICT skills of teachers: The entire approach to teaching will have to change — greater student ELELTECH INDIA 2009
participation in the classroom should lead to more two-way instruction. Continuous upgradation of ICT skills will play a key role. • Use for other purposes: Beyond the syllabus content, Kyan offers numerous multi-media possibilities to enrich the learning experience. A good indicator of impact is the extent to which the teachers are exploring the options. • Impact on community: An understanding of community response is critical to the programme, especially the reaction of the parents and the nearby schools. ICT infrastructure in the regions under study is inadequate, and the community is not aware of such interventions. The paper then presents three case studies and lists the outcome of the project. It rounds off with some conclusions. The diagrams and the graphs in the paper are based on questionnaires to the headmasters of 64 of 65 schools. (Barikul excluded.)
Elearning Goes Rural Burdwan & Bankura Bankura is in the western part of Bengal and Burdwan is to its north. Bengal is over an area area of 88,000sqkm; Bankura is the fourth-largest district with an area of 6,880sqkm, while Burdwan is second at 7,024sqkm. Bengal, according to the March 2001 census, has a population of 8 crore compared with India’s 102 crore. Burdwan’s population is 68 lakh, and Bankura’s 31 lakh. The state’s literacy rate is 69 per cent — male 77 per cent and female 59.6 per cent. India’s is 64.8 per cent, male literacy being 75 per cent and female, 54%. Bankura’s literacy rate is 64 per cent while Burdwan’s is above the state figure at 70 per cent. Burdwan is an advanced economic region,
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
a major agriculture area in the country and having many heavy industries. Bankura is backward. It’s red soil is not suited for farming, and there are a very few industries. Conceptualising elearning The ICT intervention is a technology-based process that seeks to enhance the teaching and learning experiences in the classroom. It seeks to develop a higher order of learning, thinking, problem solving and creativity in children by harnessing the power of information technology. This objective is achieved by providing the school with curriculum-based content, training teachers to use necessary technological tools and establishing systems and processes to enable them to integrate their learnings with classroom teaching. This, simply put, is interactive and collaborative learning through the use of technology. ICT rests on four major components, namely: technology, content, training and services. The approach of the project is to tap the inherent capability of the school and its teachers and assist them in creating an enriched, more effective learning environment. The programme engages the teacher as the central facilitator, but targets the learning of the student. Because effective technology-enriched learning requires far more than just technology components such as computers, such learning can occur only when training, resources and support systems are integrated in a holistic environment. This is a process that usually happens over a period of time. The project, therefore, works in partnership with schools and customises resources, training and support systems in keeping with the learning philosophy of each school. Based on research evidence and learning from ongoing programs, The ICT programme adopts an approach that includes, inter alia, the following elements: • Focus on the learner: Appreciating that the cognitive abilities of
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•
•
•
children vary with age, the ICT approach is sensitive to the age group and profile of learners. The learner is the central focus of the ICT approach. Central role for teachers: Students have a high regard for the information and opinions of teachers, who are also the interpreters of knowledge for children. The proposed teacher
training program develops interest and mointerest and motivation in teachers and encourages enhanced and alternative thinking of the teaching-learning process. Laddered approach: The project develops in a “constructivist” fashion, building on existing ground realities, in a laddered manner to ensure integration into the school. It encourages new approaches to the teachinglearning process, thereby changing the nature of the way things are done in schools. Building core competence: The exercise seeks to build core competence for the school and transfer skills to specified target groups (i.e. the teachers) through directed inputs of training and materials.
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
On Kyan IL&FS and IIT Mumbai had conceived and built the Kyan as a compact device --- the PC and the projector are a single unit covering approximately one-square-foot area --- which gives it the edge over other teaching devices, such as PC-based learning and connecting computer terminals with a TV or with a projector. In PC-based learning, students can browse educational content in groups of just 2-3, which is inadequate for a large class as the teacher will have to go around giving the same explanations to the many PC-based groups in the class. Kyan’s ability to display content on any plain surface through its inbuilt projector makes group-based learning much easy. Alternative technology platforms, which could meet the needs of a large class, such as a plasma TV or a projector are either very expensive or have limitations in their mobility, robustness and versatility. Being a compact device, the Kyan is both portable and immune from the rapid wear-and-tear that happens with devices that need to be assembled and disassembled while shifting. In places with erratic or non-existent electrical supply, the Kyan can be powered either through a solar panel, UPS or a car battery. The projection system enables the display of images of up to 300 inches. The system comes with a brightness of 2,000 lumens, which ensures visibility even in an open room during daytime. In addition, the device has all the attributes of a high-powered PC such as a high-speed processing capability, DVD/VCD/Audio CD/MP3 capability with audio amplifier and built-in speakers, data storage facility of 160GB and internet connectivity coupled with the projection system. It runs on a Pentium 4 processor and has the Intel chipset graphic solution, with 64MB dynamic video memory. Among the other attributes are CD writing facilities and appropriate ports for connectivity to the ELELTECH INDIA 2009
local area network, printer and scanner. Finally, it can function as a server, considerably reducing the cost of setting up PC-based learning centres. Apart from its intended use in classroom, the Kyan finds many other uses including as an entertainment-cum-education centre. Micro-entrepreneurs can use the device for business purposes. Companies can use it in rural areas for their targeted promotion campaigns, while government bodies and NGOs can use it to disseminate information relating to health and social awareness.
Impact Analysis Regular attendance Kyan has generated many interesting scenarios, resulting from students’ keenness to attend classes with the device. In the project area, people live a subsistence existence. Attendance of students is constrained by family emergencies. For boys, working on the fields during the harvest season is a priority over classes. For girls, household emergencies force them to be absent. Has audio-visual classes improved attendance in schools
Improved
Constant
38
26
It has been seen that on Kyan days, the attendance is much higher in a section. Teachers are saying that if there is a choice Regular Attendance
41%
Improved 59%
Constant
between class and housework, Kyan tilts the balance in favour of the former. In one school, teachers have allowed students to go
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
back home after attending the
Kyan classes. One school --- Keduadihi High School --- is promoting awareness among guardians. It can be inferred, as a first approximation, that greater participation in classes with Kyan implies attendance has improved overall at the schools. Exam result The main objective of the project is to enhance cognitive abilities through multimedia. Students should become conceptually sound through better understanding, while improving their power of recall.
Has Kyan positively impacted Kyan
Yes
No
35
18
Too early for an impact 11
Exam results have reflected the importance of the device. Students can understand lessons better and write in their own language in the answer-sheet. Diagrams in the geography and science tests are now a lot better. In Indpur Goenka High School, the headmaster said that correct answers to geometry questions had raised considerably, a sign of improved problem-solving capabilities. Students say the large size of pictures Exam Result
17% Yes
28%
55%
No Too early to have an impact
helps in keeping in mind the concepts more easily.
ELELTECH INDIA 2009
Tufan Atha a student of class IX from Jhilimili High School said, “The best part about Kyan is the visual effects which allow us to understand many thing which otherwise we used to learn by heart and write in exam paper without understanding.” Accommodate Kyan classes in regular curriculum Schools have evolved strategies for the systematic use of Kyan, both pedagogically and in scheduling of classes. Two different approaches to teaching have been seen. Some teachers combine the use of the device simultaneously with traditional teaching methods such as oral discourse and board work. Others first complete a lesson and then go through the multimedia content on the lesson. Of note is the use of the device for revision purposes at the time of exams. The schools in our survey do not have the same infrastructure, particularly relating to buildings. The other feature is the gross inadequacy of ICT infrastructure, with availability far less than what is required for efficient computer-aided learning. Discernable in this context is the absence of haphazard and random use of the device, and the stress on optimum use, subject to the numerous constraints. Regularity can be seen in the scheduling of classes, and the differences in approach attributed to varied school infrastructure. Thus, Kyan is used whenever there are two consecutive classes of a subject.
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
Are AudioVisual classes part of school routine
Yes
Nor part of routine but used systematically 15
31
Random Use
18
Kyan Classes in regular curriculum
Yes
28% 49% 23%
Not i n rou tine but used systematically Random Use
In another instance, the use is three periods a class every week. Still, in others, as many as two periods per subject a week is allotted to the device. Infrastructure differences get reflected in the location of Kyan. Some schools have two audio-visual rooms, with a Kyan in each room. A few have one in the classroom and the other in the audio-visual room. Trends from technology-aided learning register A check of the TAL registers — a logbook on the use of audio-visual classes — shows one of the schools holding as many as 300 classes with the device in over a four-month duration. Eleven schools have held more than 150 classes. These high figures are in contrast to one school where only 7 classes were held. The difference is in the attitude of the school authorities which gets permeated among the students in the form of greater enthusiasm. These apart, as many as 17 schools has held more than 50 classes in over four months which we feel, gives a more apt indication of the extent of interest and the willingness to take responsibility vis-à-vis imparting education in a multi-media format. The register’s importance was imparted to the headmasters in the awareness programme itself. IETS had told them to ELELTECH INDIA 2009
have a separate logbook to write down the subject on which a Kyan class was taken, the topic on which digital content was shown along with their comments. Sustainability The approach towards sustainability has been marked by a long-term perspective in schools, of how effectively to fit the device with school activities. One focus has been on disseminating skill-set. Trained teachers have transferred their skills to other teachers. Many schools are also considering financial sustainability after the warranty period. A sustainability fund is expected in the future. An indicator of the gradual adaptation of the device can be seen from the fact that the register got maintained in all its earnestness only from the 2008-09 academic session, though the teaching had started from October-November 2007. Last year, more time was devoted to the process of “getting adjusted”. Classes were held, and the register was accorded lesser priority. It took some time for the teachers and students to familiarise themselves with the new concept. Are schools planning sustainability plan for audio-visual classes
Yes 22
IEEE accepts color following formats:
No such plan yet 42 graphics
in
the
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
EPS,
Sustainability 27%
Yes
73%
No such plan yet
The fact of regular maintenance indicates the embedding of the device. Teachers have become proficient in the classes, and in updating the register, they have become aware that a record of the activities will generate reflection and help in greater adaptation. Over the four-month period, nine schools held less than 50 classes. The lag in many cases was because of infrastructural reasons such as power failures and inadequate classroom facilities. There have been instances here of students pressurising the teachers to hold more classes. The head master of Chanchaipalla Tapashili Adibasi High school said that if for some reason the teacher is unable to take a class with Kyan aid they student will insist on the next class to take Kyan aided class. The authorities have realised the need to improve the situation. It needs to be mentioned that in some cases, the keenness shown in holding classes has not been reflected in the maintenance of registers. Classes, therefore, have been held more than what is shown in the registers. ICT skill development of teachers Becoming
computer
ELELTECH INDIA 2009
proficient
is
an
ongoing process among the teachers, in a region where PC penetration is low and where only 2-3 of them knew computers before the project started. Broadly, teachers have become aware of the importance of teaching aids and are using more such aids in the classes. With the device at hand, teachers devote time to familiarisation, beyond classroom work, exploring the software and the digital content. In Jhilimili High School, seven teachers have acquired ICT skills through the learning-by-doing approach. Trained teachers have also been passing on their skills to others. IETS had given training to the teachers. They were for six subjects, with training on a subject for two days. For each subject, the concerned teacher attended the training. During this training, the teachers learnt handling the device, use of the mouse, working on the word processor and, very importantly, navigating the multimedia content. It was not easy for the teachers, as many of them were first-time users of the computer. In subsequent support visits, training was given on running the scanner and printer, and handling the web camera. With greater familiarity with digital content, there is a need to offer advanced training and load new software. IETS is visiting the schools with Bengali software of Webel, called CBT (Computer-based Teaching). This is a self-learning tool in computer basics in Bengali based on the open office format. Trainees get to learn various open office applications, using CBT. The software has been delivered to all the schools and demo sessions held.
Use of Kyan for other purposes Multiple use of the device has encouraged exploration and discovery of the options. Educational videos on Antartica, human physiology, nature and sea creatures have been shown, while time has been squeezed
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
to show children’s films as well. Use of Kyan for various other purposes
Yes Kyan used for office work and other purposes
Yes
No
38
26
41% 59%
The IEEE Graphics Checker Tool enables users to check graphic files. The tool will check journal article graphic files Apart from writing letters, the school authorities have used the printer, scanner and copier for official purposes. It is expected that over time more uses will be found. An interesting application is the creation of databases such as a compilation students and teachers’ profile. Impact in community Dissemination on computer-aided learning in the community has been through word-ofmouth, meetings of headmasters and meetings of mother-teacher associations. Other schools have shown interest in the programme, with their teachers paying visits to the schools with Kyan to get a first-hand view.
Other schools have shown interest?
Yes 32
Neighbouring schools have Kyan
No 28
2
Not undertaken publicity yet 2
Schools under the programme are also willing to hold demos on computer-aided learning. Sarenga Girls High School has held one such exercise for Sarenga Mission Junior School.
Case Studies Jhilimili High School ELELTECH INDIA 2009
No
Jhilimili High School is located in Ranibandh Block of Bankura district, more than 70km away from district headquarter Bankura town. The school has more than 1,300 students and good infrastructure. They have two separate audio-visual rooms in the first floor of the main building. Impact in Community
Yes
No
50% 44% 3%
Neighboring schools have kyan
3% not undertaken teachers
Separate audio-visual rooms allow to take classes without disturbing others, while allowing them to explore the device. According to the teachers, students have great interest in knowing new things. But the opportunity is very limited. Two-three young teachers have done very interesting work. With the support of the local cable operator they created three CDs on human physiology, nature and oceans.
The school-in-charge (they are senior teachers who take up the responsibility of a head-master if the school does not have a head-master) said that he was keen on developing audio content in Bengali and even did a demo for the students. But he did not find it much interesting as there were no visuals. The idea was to use teachers’ voice
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
as they were very familiar to the students. He has shown keen interest on training for content development by teachers with available equipments. Saurav Mondal, a student of class XI of the school, considers Kyan as a value addition to the traditional teaching method. Said Saurav: “The best part about Kyan is the visuals especially the movements of animals. It gives us a pleasure when we get to know things beyond the syllabus. It satisfies the strong desire to know new things” Keliapathar High School Keliapathar High School is in Indpur Block, around 30km from district headquarters Bankura. The school-in-charge considers Kyan as a strong tool to strengthen learning capabilities. The school has two separate audio-visual rooms, with teachers discussing among themselves so that all of them can take Kyan classes regularly. The students’ favorite, “Saurav Sir”, the physics teacher who had joined the school last year, said that the students were very much interested. “But we all teachers are very much willing as it really helps the students and allows us to give more”. Tapashi Layek a student of class IX said that Kyan was good for all students, from the weak to the best. The weaker ones have benefited the most. They usually do not understand everything what the teacher says but get a clear idea when they see the learning materials in multimedia. For average students, Kyan is good because it helps them to revise what they have learnt in classes. The better ones gain considerably as the multimedia lessons pose many challenging questions that bring out the best out of them. The school-in-charge of Keliapathar, who is teaching for the past 30 years, said: “I heard from local people that they talk about Kyan-aided teaching and would prefer sending their children to our school. I think this is one of reasons behind the increase in student enrollment.” Sarenga Girls High School Sarenga Girls High School’s head mistress
ELELTECH INDIA 2009
and teachers realised that Kyan has great potential to disseminate knowledge. They discussed how beneficial it has been during a conference of All Bengal Teachers’ Association (ABTA). From then on, many teachers, headmasters of different schools were keen to see Kyan and its use. The headmistress, Ms Kabita Mondol, initially felt that it was not possible to bring students from many schools for demonstration. However, after discussion with all other teachers she decided to organize a demo Kyan-aided class for the Sarengha Mission Junior School, which is located around 1.5KM away from Sarenga Girls High School. The headmaster of the Sarengha Mission Junior School, Mr Tuhin Kanti Mondol, was very happy with this idea. He was very well aware about Kyan and felt privileged that the students from his school would get an opportunity to attend Kyan-aided classes. Around 40 students of the 5th standard of Sarenga Mission Junior School was taken to Sarenga Girls. Two periods were given to them on English. The students were very excited. Sudeb Pal a student of Sarenga Mission said, “We read the chapter on ‘article’ before. But when didimoni (teacher) showed us the exercise, we found it great. We gave prompt answers to what we were asked after teaching. I wish I could join a school that has Kyan”.
Conclusion India is set to become the most populated country in another 40 years. According to the government’s National Commission on Population, it will be 1.53 billion by 2050. Education will play a key role in turning this population into an asset by way of a huge reservoir of human capital. Elearning with its ability to enrich the study experience, improve problem solving capabilities and promote a more participative knowledge experience should play a key role, necessitating large investments, particularly from the government’s social sector fund. The problem of school dropouts poses a huge challenge in strengthening the
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Digital Dreams for All: Embedding e-Learning in Rural Schools
country’s human capital. Nowhere is the problem more acute than in Bengal, which makes the Kyan project very significant. On an all-India basis, it’s dropout rate at 11.5 per cent is ahead of only Sikkim. (Jayachandran) IETS under another programme is installing Kyans at least 10 more districts of Bengal. It has also equipped 100 government-run girls’ schools in Assam with the elearning tool. For Burdwan and Bankura our recommendations are: • More Kyans need to be installed at the existing schools; additional schools must be brought under the coverage of the device. • Warranty period needs to be extended from one year to three, and a dedicated technical person for timely maintenance and repair be appointed. • More training programmes for the teachers are necessary. Teachers should be trained on content creation. • Bulk of Kyan contents is in English. They need to be in Bengali. • Schools must create emergency expense funds. They can take a small amount from students on a monthly basis. Schools can also be given an annual maintenance grant. • Organise sharing meeting involving all the schools, so that teachers can share their experiences in the use of the device. • Of importance is the need to develop the IT infrastructure, which should include ensuring stable electricity in the rural areas. A more direct intervention is to provide recycled computers to the needy students, particularly among the more meritorious ones. This necessitates a coherent approach involving the government, corporates, NGOs and interested parties. ELELTECH INDIA 2009
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT The author thanks Debojyoti Basu of IETS, Calcutta, for advice during our work, Jhulan Ghose, Sankari Banik, Sanjib Kundu, Soumitra Mondal from Change Initiatives for their field work. Special thanks to the headmasters and teachers of the 65 schools for giving us the time whenever required not only for the interviews but also for clarifications and suggestions. REFERENCES [1] Don Slater, Jo Tacchi, ICT Innovations for Poverty Reduction, New Delhi: Unesco, 2004, pp. 1–4, 85-91 [2] Usha Jayachandran, “How High Are Dropout Rates in India?” Economic & Political Weekly, March 23, 2007, pp. 982-983. Comment on Amit Choudhury’s “Revisiting Dropouts, Old Issues, Fresh Perspectives” EPW, December 23, 2006.
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E-Learning and its Impact on Learning
E-Learning and its Impact on Learning Abstract:
Sudipta S. Majumdar Honeywell Technology Solutions, Bangalore Mr. Sudipta S. Majumdar is a Bachelor of Computer Science and Engineering from Jadavpur University, Kolkata. He is the Head of Learning and Development at Honeywell Technology Solutions, Bangalore. He has over twenty four years of experience in the IT industry and has been associated with several roles in database administration, custom application, ERP implementations, project management, data warehousing and software quality assurance and human resources.
Learning is a part of the fabric of Honeywell and the company’s leadership constantly focuses on continuous learning as a mantra for staying ahead in the competitive global market place. Three years ago HTS started its e-learning journey, by leveraging “NETg”, an online resource procured from an external service provider, with a host of generic e-learning modules ranging from desktop applications and IT skills to soft skill modules. Later the “NETg” resources were replaced by the “Skill Soft” repository. The Learning Management System (LMS), a global Web-based learning library, registration and management system was implemented for HTS, India in Q2, 2008. The initial response to e-learning was lukewarm as there was a lot of skepticism on the effectiveness of the learning and the prevalence of a strong preference for instructor led trainings. Secondly there was a lack of robust tracking system that made it difficult to assess the e-learning usage and its impact. Importance of E-learning
Ramesh Chandra Honeywell Technology Solutions, India Mr. Ramesh Chandra is a Bachelor of Engineering from the University of Bangalore in the stream of Electronic and Communication. He is currently a specialist for e-elearning and Domain trainings at Honeywell Technology Solutions, India. He was instrumental in designing and implementing Knowledge Management strategies in various small and medium scale enterprises during his tenure at Inkroma Technologies. He is an active member of the e-learning guild and other forums that revolve around e-learning and its trends in effective and efficient learning mechanisms adopted in various other companies.
In India, HTS has multiple sites, due to which the travel cost on account of training was rising. With the sudden economic downturn in the later part of 2008, it made perfect business sense to use e-learning and virtual classes through video-conferencing. The traditional training needs analysis followed by scheduled classroom training is the model followed at HTS. Today employees want the learning experience to be self paced, just in time and not necessarily when scheduled by the Training department. In a sense e-learning provides the correct answer. Their managers love this too, as it saves downtime in their projects and improves the overall productivity. HTS is primarily an engineering and research organization with a tremendous zeal to
ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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E-Learning and its Impact on Learning
spread knowledge about its products, technology and processes. As a captive unit, it is important to develop the capability to nurture and spread domain knowledge. The LMS provided the platform to host a variety of SCORM compliant e-learning modules, which were developed by the local and global subject matter experts and can be accessed by employees around the world Over the years with the integration brought about by globalization, demonstration of capability by the emerging regions units and the threat of the aging population in the developed countries, a new paradigm seem to emerge. The knowledge and skills of the aging experts of the West were captured in electronic media and delivered to the young, eager and talented workforce in the East through e-learning portals.
6.
7.
8.
9.
to be a blend of e-learning and classroom sessions. Branding the E-learning initiative to bring in visibility and facilitate its adoption. Targeted communication through newsletter and other means about e-learning popular titles. Identify technologies like WebEx, Adobe Connect to conduct virtual classes and reduce travelling for training purposes. Teaching authoring tools to technical experts and faculty members. Setting up of a mixing studio to integrate multi-media e-learning content for developing more effective and rich content in-house. Reducing the cost of training per employee by 10% leveraging existing Honeywell e-learning resources and engaging internal subject matter experts in content development and teaching.
E-Learning Strategy Impact of E-learning In December, 2008 the Training department under the guidance of HR Director and HTS President framed the e-learning strategy. This document suggested ways to improve the cost structure and address some constraints on account of the rapidly deteriorating business outlook and its challenges through the use of e-learning options. The E-Learning following:
strategy
included
the
1. Increasing the usage of the e-learning to 20%-30% of the formal trainings. 2. Targeting 20% of the existing instructor lead training (ILT)courses for conversion to e-learning 3. Promoting utilization of the “Skill Soft” resources sponsored by the Honeywell corporate for soft skill, engineering, tools and other technical training for employees and trainees. 4. Promote development of Domain elearning modules of Honeywell products and technology and launch them in LMS. 5. Entry level training by leveraging elearning instead of ILT. Existing classroom trainings to be either converted to e-learning or re-engineered ELELTECH INDIA 2009
As a result of deploying these well defined strategies and leveraging the capabilities of LMS, e-learning courses became more popular and the number of entry level classroom training came down. In the current year, engineer trainees were directed to exploit the e-learning titles thereby reducing the training costs. More emphasis was put on “On the Job” Training (OJT). We are aware that in difficult times, there are sudden fluctuations in business demand for well trained resources. The imperative is to quickly re-skill the available resources and redeploy them to fulfill the skill requirement. Blended learning options were exercised for the “Internal Fulfillment” program. Recently 30 Java developers were retrained on “Dot Net” utilizing e-learning modules and were later provided Domain specific orientation before assigning them to their new roles. By April 2009, the e-learning usage has shot to 22% of the overall learning hours as compared to 2% in the corresponding period last year. We plan to develop more than 50 e-learning modules, mostly on Domain,
65
E-Learning and its Impact on Learning
Product, Technology or Engineering Process as compared to around 12 last year. Conclusion HTS has taken a giant leap in translating its e-learning vision through the well defined strategies and implementing innovative ideas making the learning experience more effective. This journey not only provided us the confidence but also created value. As the effects of economic slow down became more apparent with shrinking training budgets and the ever increasing dynamic learning needs of the organization, this was the way to go. Index Terms— LMS, Blended Learning, ELearning Strategy, Learning effectiveness
INTRODUCTION oneywell is a diversified technology and leader of aerospace Hmanufacturing products and services; control technologies for buildings, homes and industry; automotive products; power generation systems; specialty chemicals; fibers; plastics and advanced materials. Honeywell is headquartered in Morristown, NJ employing 120,000 employees in over 100 countries. Honeywell Technology Solutions (HTS) provides business oriented total solutions to Honeywell businesses in the areas of Aerospace, Automation and Control Solutions, Research, New Product development, IT solutions and services. HTS has offices in Bangalore, Madurai and Hyderabad and employs over 5000 people in India. It also has operations in Czech Republic and China as part of its global presence.
E-LEARNING JOURNEY Learning is a part of the fabric of Honeywell Technology Solutions (HTS) and the company’s leadership constantly focuses on continuous learning as a mantra for staying ahead in the competitive global market place. Initial focus was largely concentrated in establishing a robust system of instructor led training (ILT) conducted by external vendors and internal faculty. The leadership ELELTECH INDIA 2009
development trainings program is guided by the Honeywell corporate curriculum, where the Engineering tools and Domain trainings are has blend of the local and proprietary content. The EARLY DAYS Three years ago HTS started its e-learning journey, by leveraging “NETg”, an online resource procured from an external service provider, with a host of generic e-learning modules ranging from desktop applications and IT skills to soft skill modules. Later the “NETg” resources were replaced by the “Skill Soft” repository. For an average employee the e-learning experience was largely limited to mandatory compliance, like Code of Business Conduct. There was limited interest in exploring the Corporate LMS and training spot lights still remained with classroom sessions. The initial response to e-learning was rather lukewarm as there was a lot of skepticism on the effectiveness of the learning and the prevalence of a strong preference for instructor led trainings. Secondly there was a lack of robust tracking system that made it difficult to track the e-learning usage and its impact. BUILDING LAUNCHING PAD The Learning Management System (LMS), a global Web-based learning library, registration and management system was implemented for HTS, India in Q2, 2008. The LMS is based on a Saba 5.3 implementation that required some restructuring of the learning architecture and systems. The implementation was carried out in two phases, and met the challenge in transitioning the training administration to an enterprise tool, which its restrictions and limitation, but training the entire workforce was also a great achievement. With the LMS established as the foundation of launching the local e-learning content development and promotion was firmly laid. This allowed us to develop local content and share the
66
E-Learning and its Impact on Learning
same with the Honeywell global population and vice versa. CHANGING HABITS In India, HTS has multiple sites, due to which the travel cost on account of training was rising. With the sudden economic downturn in the later part of 2008, it made perfect business sense to use e-learning and virtual classes through video-conferencing. As the training budgets were under pressure, hard choices were made in running vendor led training with significant scrutiny. Developing e-learning content and exploring this medium in place of basic faculty led trainings were preferred. Secondly, the leaders were given the responsibility to teach and mentor their teams as part of their standard tasks.
Ho urs
Organisation Wide Total Learning Hours - 2008 35000 30000 25000 20000 15000 10000 5000 0
Fornal Training Hours Internal Training Hours KM CoP Elearning Mentee Hours Jan
Mar
May
July
Sept
Nov
Months
Fig. 1. Organization wide total Learning Hours as recorded in the year 2008 at HTS. .
The total learning hours of 2008, presented an interesting study. The global slowdown that suggested some tough choices in the training spends and this realization hit the learning function in Oct 2008. The number of formal ILT class room sessions decreased and at the same time the e-learning usage climbed up to around 15% of the formal training hours and 6% of the overall learning hours by December 2008.
Hours
Organisation Wide Total Learning Hours - 2008 35000 30000 25000 20000 15000 10000 5000 0
Fornal Training Hours Internal Training Hours KM CoP
Fig. 2. Organization wide Learning Pie composed of various components of the learning mechanism in the year 2008 at HTS, Bangalore. The events of later part of 2008 and acceptance of the LMS as the launching pad for driving web based learning, acted as a catalyst in accelerating this momentum that has gained more acceptance and appreciation in the following months. IMPORTANCE OF E-LEARNING The traditional training needs analysis followed by scheduled classroom training is the model followed at HTS. Today employees want the learning experience to be self paced, just in time and not necessarily when scheduled by the Learning department. In a sense e-learning provides the correct answer. Their managers love this too, as it saves downtime in their projects and improves the overall productivity. When classroom training is scheduled, last minute drops out were common, as sudden project events, and reluctance of managers to release all the key team members for an important training is also understandable. Elearning provides these managers, with the flexibility and convenience of any time learning. Team members during the slow periods of their projects, prefer to catch up with some learning by exploring web based trainings on LMS. HTS is primarily an engineering and research organization with a tremendous zeal to spread knowledge about its products, technology and processes. As a captive unit, it is important to develop the capability to nurture and spread domain knowledge. The LMS provided the platform to host a variety of SCORM compliant e-learning modules, which were developed by the local and global subject matter experts and can be accessed by employees around the world
Elearning Mentee Hours Jan
Mar
May
July
Sept
E-LEARNING STRATEGY
Nov
Months
ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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E-Learning and its Impact on Learning
In December, 2008 the Learning department under the guidance of HR Director and HTS President framed the e-learning strategy. This document suggested ways to improve the cost structure and address some constraints on account of the rapidly deteriorating business outlook and its challenges through the use of e-learning options. This strategy also postulated basic ground rules like the Make Buy decision points. Salient points of E-Learning strategy: Increasing the usage of the e-learning to 20%-25% of the formal trainings. HTS have been giving utmost importance to talent development and knowledge management, and each year targets are set to improve the overall learning investment. In 2008 as well as in 2009, the organization had set a target to accord 50 hours of learning per employee. Last year we catered to around 64 hours of learning per employee but formal class room, elearning, community of practices and mentoring components were not as pronounced. This year we plan to push the e-learning component of the overall formal trainings (ILT and web based) to around 40 hours per employee on the average. As on June 30th, 2009 the usage of e-learning has increased to 25.6% of formal learning hours.
Fig. 3. Sub process level analysis of the Leaning Hours at HTS, in the period January to June, 2009. Targeting 20% of the existing instructor led training (ILT) courses for conversion to e-learning. The Instructor Led Training in Soft Skills, Project Management and technical training earlier involved faculty from
ELELTECH INDIA 2009
external sources, and that called for considerable training spend. In order to free up the resources, it was suggested to convert around 20% of class room trainings in the entry levels to elearning. Some of the soft skill trainings that did not involve any experiential learning like Time Management were just replaced with the Skill Soft titles. There were initial roadblocks, but we realized that once an individual gets the taste of self driven, self paced learning option, the managers and the team members were more comfortable with this medium of instruction. Promoting utilization of the “Skill Soft” resources sponsored by the Honeywell for behavior, engineering, tools and other technical training for employees and trainees. Whenever a request comes to the Learning team to develop a new training at the basic or entry level, the first place to check of an availability of relevant title is the e-learning repository Skill Soft. If there are titles that meet the expectations of the learner, it is a hit and additional development cost is avoided. Online books were also leveraged for technical knowledge and the Knowledge Centre provides this service to the project teams. Promote development of Domain elearning modules of Honeywell products and technology and launch them in LMS. HTS has a unique place in the business, as it is the confluence of nearly all the lines of business of Honeywell. Being primarily an engineering organization, learning about bout the various Honeywell products and services and propagating the knowledge to newly inducted engineering is crucial to its competitiveness and edge.
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E-Learning and its Impact on Learning
Most of the e-learning conversion is focused on the Domain trainings, where subject matter experts develop the Learning Hours Sub Process Analysis 35000 30000
KM CoP
Hours
25000
Mentoring
20000 15000
Elearning
suggesting specific e-learning modules like soft skill titles, SAP basics and other common interest titles. Newsletter, posters and other promotional mechanism are also used to spread awareness about the importance of learning and the role of e-learning in effective learning and skill building.
Internal Training
10000
Fornal Classroom Training
5000 0 Jan
Feb
Mar
Apr
May
June
2009
training content and the modules are launched through the LMS allowing anyone in the Honeywell family to use the assets. Sharing and cross leveraging e-learning modules either West to East or East to East have been a hallmark as fruits of globalization. Entry level training by leveraging elearning instead of ILT. Existing classroom trainings to be either converted to e-learning or re-engineered to be a blend of e-learning and classroom sessions. As we develop the learning maps for our critical competencies, one of guidelines have been from the leadership, is to leverage e-learning for entry level trainings. As the numbers of participants are higher, this forms the most feasible, effective and cost optimal way of training successive batch of new joiners. In fact this year we have reengineered existing ILT to blended options, with a mix of e-learning and classroom trainings and that are managed as curricula or certifications in LMS. Branding the E-learning initiative to bring in visibility and facilitate its adoption. Adoption and penetration of e-learning in an organization of our size and complexity is a huge change management process. This year we are undertaking keen interest in branding the initiative, with targeted email ELELTECH INDIA 2009
Identify technologies to conduct virtual classes and reduce travelling for training purposes. Teaching authoring tools to technical experts and faculty members. There is nothing as good as doing it on your own. We understood that despite all good intentions the Learning function cannot facilitate the development of elearning content for all the different competencies and technical subjects on its own. The practitioners were introduced to the MS Live Meeting tool to conduct virtual classes to a geographically spread learning community. Authoring tool like Breeze was taught to the experienced technical experts, who developed their own training content, which were then hosted on LMS. This initial success with Breeze has been very encouraging, and lately business leaders have preferred this mode of self – reliance on teaching and spreading the knowledge. Setting up of a mixing studio to integrate multi-media e-learning content for developing more effective and rich material in-house. Our leadership has been visionary much early on and has made budget allocation for setting up a mixing studio in our newly constructed campus in Bangalore. This studio is being equipped with the state of the art equipment for slicing and dicing multimedia content and packaging rich and effective learning modules. We hope to get this facility operational later this year. This would also allow technical experts to conduct
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virtual classrooms to the individual desktops, with video and audio capabilities right across the globe. Reducing the cost of training per employee by 10% by leveraging existing elearning resources and engaging internal subject matter experts in content development and teaching. Finally it all boils down to pure economics and e-learning push has enabled us to reduce the per person training costs along with other measure like involving internal faculty by around 17% of the last year per capita training cost. This is by no means easy, but all these add up the better utilization of resources, effective learning and allowing investments in newer areas and competencies, where external resources are required.
CASE STUDIES There are compelling arguments for elearning. Some pundits are of the opinion that “E-learning, when done well, can be as good as or better than being in the classroom. It offers students a rich, compelling, and motivating experience”. We think E-learning not only enhances access, but also improves engagement, enhances learning, extends experiences in exploring, and empowers the learners to take responsibility for scheduling and managing the learning journey. HTS recognizes the benefits of e-learning because it provides just-in-time, contemporary learning and can be accessed using the right technology. It is seen as a cost effective approach in facilitation of learning to large groups using information and communication technology. The content could be personalized and is embedded in a learner centered framework. Employee training needs can be understood under three perspectives access, comprehensive approach to knowledge and a balance between training and information. Access has four dimensions, (a) technical as in having the infrastructure to connect to
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the information, (b) empowerment, as in having the authority or permission to retrieve and use the information, (c) flexibility as in accommodating the schedules of the learner and not the schedule of the trainers and (d) time as in having the time to spend obtaining, reviewing, absorbing and learning the information.
Skill Soft for Behavioral skills trainings Encouraging employees to take e-learning, specifically for topics that may seem dry or irrelevant can prove to be a challenge in some organizations. Adopting web based training for very popular courses can be an opportunity to take training to a higher level, if you can do it right. HTS came up with a strategy to leverage “Skill Soft” behavioral titles instead of the traditional ILT model, thereby brining down the cost significantly. This approach opened up new avenues of learning to the employees and was well received and accepted. Time Management one of most popular behavior classroom trainings in 2008 was discontinued in 2009. Employees liked the idea of learning at their own pace and leisure. The other aspect of this strategy resulted in considerable cost savings that enabled the HTS to explore and invest in building new and emerging competencies. The soft skills trainings like business presentation still remains a classroom sessions, as there is more participant involvement, video recording and analysis. E-Learning for Pathway trainees (entry level) HTS inducts interns from engineering colleges in their final semester each year. After induction the interns or Pathway trainees are put through an intensive training of 6 weeks followed by projects in the businesses. This was costing a huge amount of money and the trainees were not getting sufficient time to work in the projects.
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Moreover handling trainings at three different locations was very expensive and time consuming. Thus streamlining the training process for the project trainees was inevitable. The bandwidth of the internal trainers were insufficient to meet the training requirement, this led to delayed trainings and inconsistent training both in terms of delivery and content. To overcome these issues HTS decided to adopt e-learning. This not only reduced the cost of training but also enabled the trainees to learn at their own pace and also devote more time in their projects. This was a huge success story because the trainees were able to spend more time in projects and also complete the training in a timely manner. We identified 30 modules ranging from database design and coding to programming languages and few soft skill trainings as the training curricula. The trainees were given access to Skill soft and given the learning road map that provided the monthly training schedule with the trainings that the trainees were expected to complete within a specified time period. Tool Mentors One of the key elements of the e-learning strategy is to empower employees to create small learning objects by providing them training on a simple authoring tool. This started to attract a lot of interest and proved to be a huge success. By training the Subject Matter Experts (SME) in creating simple e-learning modules allowed those to express their knowledge independently that could reach a large audience. This caused significant momentum in the SMEs to develop new trainings on advanced topics that were launched through the LMS. It also enabled the learners to understand the concepts better as the material were developed by faculty themselves without the help of intermediaries. The tool mentors are one such set of elearning that are developed by the subject matter experts to training employees on engineering tool. These modules were more ELELTECH INDIA 2009
relevant because these included detailed explanations and recommended best practices. The advantage of creating these tool mentor E-learning was to provide the employees not only any time any pace learning but also just in time solution for a particular problem that the project team might face. This was a faster way to learn with a global reach of 10000 participants taking advantage of these modules. The module developed was customized to the needs of the customer such as tool related and best practices, which only an SME working hands on will have an idea about. By empowering the SME brought in that extra edge of finesses in the learning which a person developing outside the project would not have been able to bring. The learning was effective as project specific issues were explored, and the experts have an in-depth understanding of the subject matter. They had a feel for these issues and were able to correlate their learning’s with the issues faced by the teams. This helped in standardization of tools and best practices across the domain in different projects across the globe. It also helped the learners to select a particular topic and go through that any number of times which is not possible in a conventional instructor led training. The instructional designed was done professionally such that that the learner’s objective is met. These modules were a combination of static slides, videos and animations, which made learning very effective and retention of the knowledge was higher. Blended Learning Solutions Blended Learning is the latest buzzword in corporate training. It sounds so simple – mixing e-learning with other types of training delivery. We know that different problems require different solutions (different mixes of media and delivery) – and we believe that the key is to apply the right mix to a given business problem.
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Hence blended learning was introduced as a strategy to make the learning more effective. “Blended Learning” is really the natural evolution of e-learning into an integrated program of multiple media types, applied toward a business problem in an optimum way, to solve a business problem.
developers were retrained on .Net utilizing e-learning modules and were later provided Domain specific orientation in the classroom before taking up their new roles. Elearning % in Formal Training Hours 30.0%
With this in mind we came up with a strategy to convert some of the entry level trainings to e-learning modules which were made pre-requisites to take up the advanced classroom trainings. This approach was first tried out with the Honeywell Building Solutions team. A web-based course for introduction followed by a real “hands-on” interactive class, proved to be very effective as the e-learning was reinforced by the classroom training. The biggest business benefit of blended learning was the reduction of delivery costs. It also brought all the participants to the classroom session at the same level of awareness about the topic before the class. The introductory Project Management trainings was also restructured as a blended learning options, with awareness of tools and PM practices were suggested as Skill Soft modules, and the classroom session concentrate on showing Project planning tool skills and sharing war stories based on faculties experience. IMPACT ON LEARNING As a result of implementing the well defined strategies and with the implementation of LMS, e-learning courses became popular; the number of classroom training in basic subjects came down. In the current year, entry level trainees were directed to exploit the e-learning titles thereby reducing the training costs, and instead more emphasis was put on “On the Job” Training (OJT).
25.0% 20.0% % Elearning Hours
15.0% 10.0% 5.0% 0.0% Jan
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Mar
Apr
May
June
2009
Fig. 4. Share of E-Learning hours out of the total formal training hours at HTS, Bangalore in January to June, 2009. 1H 2009 2008 Formal Training Hours 68786 180747 E-learning Hours 23627 24755 % 25.6% 12.0% Fig. 5. Comparison of the E-learning and formal training hours of the year 2008 and the first six months of 2009. By June 2009, the e-learning usage has shot to 25.6% of the overall learning hours as compared to 12% last year. We plan to develop more than 50 e-learning modules, mostly on Domain, Product, Technology or Engineering Process as compared to around 12 last year. 1H 2009 Learning Pie (Hours)
15% 2%
We are aware that in difficult times, there are sudden fluctuations in demand for well trained resources. The imperative was to quickly re-skill the available resources and redeploy them. Blended learning options were exercised for the “Internal Fulfillment” programs. Recently 30 Java
Feb
4% 45%
Fornal Training Hours Internal Training Hours CoP Elearning Mentee Hours
34%
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E-Learning and its Impact on Learning
Fig. 6. The leaning Pie depicting the share of the various learning components in the first six months of 2009 at HTS. The Learning Pie of 1H 2009 presents a very satisfying study with the e-learning component shooting from 6% of the overall leaning hours in Dec 2008 to 15% of the same investment by June 2009. This healthy trend of increased usage of e-learning resources, and robust mechanism to capture and develop web based learning content, we are much better placed to face to learning needs of the organization when the green shoots of recovery translated in robust growth path in the coming months or years.
CONCLUSION HTS has taken a giant leap in articulating its e-learning vision through the well defined strategies and implementing innovative ideas making the learning experience more effective. The experience that we have gathered during not only provided us the confidence but also created value as the effects of economic slow down became more apparent with shrinking training budgets and the ever increasing dynamic learning needs of the organization. However, we recognize that this is but journey and the benefits that accrue are must more valuable from a long term perspective. In these challenging times, when uncertainties dictate us to use more discretion and prudence in managing the bottom line, there is always a different view. It is time to do things differently and this also opens avenues to improve. It is time to “sharpen the saw” and we are HTS often say. The investment in e-learning is one of the strategies that provide us the opportunity to make it happen. We hope that this would enable the workforce to be battle ready to ride the next wave of business opportunity in the coming years.
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APPENDIX Make versus Buy Strategy Development In Process house Selection audience & learning objectives Content development & Analysis Instructional Design & Storyboard creation Authoring & Integration Evaluation
Outsour ce
Buy
LMS hosting Tracking HTS
Vendor
Fig. 7. The Make versus Buy strategy The Make versus Buy strategy was deliberated and proposed keeping in mind the internal capabilities and resources and the effectiveness of engaging the external vendors to bring speed to the E-learning development process, and cost optimal way to ensure proper quality in the final deliverable. It was very clear from the onset, as HTS wanted to leverage its strengths and cultivate the efficiencies of the eco-system in a very practical and thoughtful way. This resulted in deployment of external vendors in instructional design, storyboarding and authoring of training material for some of the training material when there were no internal bandwidth or where the content was very straight forward. Whenever, there was a possibility of greater interaction of the subject matter expert in the development process, it was handled by
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E-Learning and its Impact on Learning
internal resources. Development of Breeze by technical experts also added to this category. As for off the shelf there procurement, it was very difficult to integrate with the LMS, and hence most were procured for the Knowledge Centre. ACKNOWLEDGMENT Sudipta S. Majumdar and Ramesh Chandra thank the Krishna Mikkilineni, President and MD, HTS for his guidance and support in driving e-learning vision in the organization. We would also like to appreciate the Sheela Singh, Global Director HR, HTS for her constant support and encouragement to implement the strategies. We would also like to put on record the contribution of the members of the Learning and Development team in providing the learning, metrics and case study details. REFERENCES [1] Marc J. Rosenberg, “E-learning – Strategies for delivering Knowledge in the Digital Age”
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Web Technologies for Teaching: A Practitioner's experience
Web Technologies for Teaching: A Practitioner's experience Abstract:
Ravindra Dastikop SDM College of Engineering & Technology, Dharwad Mr. Ravindra Dastikop, Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, SDM College of Engineering & Technology, Dharwad 580 002
In this paper we report a real world experiences in harnessing web resources for enhancing teaching process in an engineering college environment. SDM CET is an engineering college under VTU, Belgaum and offers both UG and PG courses in engineering. The author is a faculty in the department of computer science and engineering. He is exploring web resources that can be used in conjunction with teaching and has been adopting them ever since. Starting from email usage for exchanging questions and answers with a class way back in 2000, he has conducted a couple of experiments and currently using an assorted set of web tools to conduct class delivery entirely on the web.
1. Introduction Periodically, technological advances have changed the pace and shape of every human endeavor. Education is no exception. The process of Education has been radically affected and hugely benefited by continuously changing technological advances. For instance, the invention of printing press and the consequent ability to produce books in large numbers created new way of organizing education and determined the structure of university. In the contemporary world, the WEB, ability of network technologies (Internet) to collect data from anywhere on the net and their ability to deliver the same anywhere on the network and at anytime has tremendous potential in augmenting the educational or teaching process. Efforts by various agencies both business and otherwise (such as http://moodle.com) have created a wealth of web-based resources that can be exploited for transforming teaching process. Today web has become a blackboard. Web's basic value proposition is connectivity and content. Both of these value propositions ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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Web Technologies for Teaching: A Practitioner's experience
have direct and far reaching implications and immediate uses in teaching. (1) Connectivity allows a teacher to (a) get connected to and retain connections with learners beyond the walls for traditional class rooms and (b) share content created by him with his students in particular and with the rest of the world in general. (2) Content on the web has an enriching impact and true potential for transforming entire teaching experience. Content on the web can used directly, or customized to meet one's class needs or can be used to augment the content one already has. In effect we have today all the resources on the web both content and tools for successful practice of web-based teaching. In this paper we present our experience in using web technologies in teaching profession. The rest of the paper is organized as follows. Section 2 enlists and describes a range of resources available for enriching teaching process. These resources range from such as important searchable archives to contents updated on minute by minute bases. Section 3 describes some experiments done in our classroom teaching using various tools. Section 4 conclusions and future work
2. Web is a veritable resource for educators For a couple of years, I have been experimenting on how best I can harness technologies for teaching. For the current academic year 2008-9, I am teaching a course titled Management and Entrepreneurship [3] for the VI semester of Computer Science and Engineering at SDM College of Engineering & Technology, Dharwad. The institute is affiliated to Vishwesvaraya Technological University, Belgaum. I am teaching this course for two divisions each of class strength 60+. 2.1 Teaching Process Teaching is a process of live rendering of content for a select audience called class. The teaching life cycle consists of course requirement, design content procurement and delivery. Teaching brings content into live in a class room. Teaching may be ELELTECH INDIA 2009
defined as a process that converts outside resources into outside results, namely learning deliverables namely learning experiences. Teaching process consists of design, development and delivery of a course 2.2 Using web as a teaching resource General and advanced uses of web for education have a long history [(1, 2)]. Educational services on the web can take advantages of net's twin abilities: Ability to gather resources from anywhere on web and to deliver the content to the learner in various formats either in the classroom or any other place such as hostel or home. Web has enough resources to support this teaching process. For instance, ACM curriculum [4] available online is good reference for any faculty designing a new course or updating an existing one. Pertaining to computer science and engineering, we have a source in curriculum search [5] that help students as well as faculty to access a wide range of academic materials such as lectures, assignments to name a few. In fact we used this as a basic reference in deigning a first course in Intellectual property Rights for our autonomy courses. The printed word made human thought more permanent and made it available beyond the time and locations of the author. The hyper word i.e. matter written using hypertext goes beyond. It eliminates the barriers of time, distant and even language and makes author almost omnipresent. The ability of hyper word to capture and convey thought or message and also get reader connected to another author or text has tremendous implications for teaching profession. As a teacher he can make his works accessible to many more learners than he had imagined a couple of years ago and as a seeker of content, he can be standing on the shoulders of giants. Sources such as Wikipedia, and tools such as Google, and dictionary are some of the giants on whose shoulders he can stand and reach further. In effect web has a range of resources for supporting the entire teaching process.
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Web Technologies for Teaching: A Practitioner's experience
2.2.1 Web is source for curriculum design Curriculum design is an occasional but an important stage in teaching process. Unless you have been handed out a neatly designed course, it becomes teacher's first job to design one. In computer science and engineering field well known curriculum design sources include ACM and IEEE Curriculum [5]. 2.2.2 Web is reference library Web is a globally accessible reference source. Be it particular text book or reference book or research paper, web is a dependable place to search and find. Practically it is far easier to search for certain category of teaching related resource on the web than to do that on personal library or one's desktop. Sources such as Wikipedia or Answers.com or whatis are good and handy sources to begin with. In the discipline of computer science and engineering we have Google created Curriculum search - a great source for resource such as syllabi, assignments, lectures etc. 2.2.3 Web is black board Web has resource in bloggers that can be used as blackboard. It can used to publish academic related such as class notes, syllabus etc. For instance you may visit this. 2.2.4 Web is a your messenger Web tools such as alert services help a teacher in keeping abreast with current development in the area of his interest and thus keep in updated. 2.2.5 Web is a notebook Online docs have a huge potential to serve faculty as a point for note taking, editing and publishing documents such as assignments, home works, question banks etc 2.2.6 Web is class room While web can act as a black board, it can also serve as class room in real time and also ELELTECH INDIA 2009
as an extended class room beyond working hours. 2.2.7 Web is your presentation and projector Using presentation has become an integral part of class room delivery. On resources such as online documents have a great tool in them to help teacher to create effective presentation. 2.2.8 Web is community Wikies and groups help teachers to create a community of students and help develop different communication strategies 2.3 Computing Facility at SDM College of Engineering & Technology The campus wide network at SDM CET is the state of the art in service. The wireless internet connectivity is extended to class rooms, library and hostels. Thus it provides an ideal infrastructure for using web technologies for teaching. Each faculty has a lab top provided by the institute and many of students carry personal lab tops to class room • blogs • wikis • emails • chatting • custom search engines • online docs • Class room delivery tools such as quiz makers etc
3. EXPERIEMENTS 3.1 Experiment 1: Using email to send questions to students and receive their answers. In 2000 we were having a laboratory course titled Basic Skills Lab (BSL). The objective of the course was to introduce to and familiarize students with basic and general purpose tools such as word processorediting, mail merge, spreadsheet, HTMLdesigning home pages, linking other pages to given page, email- sending and receiving message etc. This was ideal situation for
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faculty to use email as an instructional medium and also testing means. Faculty used to send some questions to each student separately and students were expected to send their answers by the time they come to lab next week. Remember this was a time when email was not popular among students and our approach provided an excellent exposure to a tool that they might need all through their professional and personal life. 3.2 Experiment 2: Using Web Tools for conducting Seminar on Project 3.2.1 Background Seminar on Project or simply Seminar is an integral part of VIII semester engineering course. The idea behind this academic activity is to encourage student to come up with an interesting topic connected to academics and make a presentation to the entire class. The entire process of seminar is expected to help student on how to choose a topic; research references to prepare the content for presentation and finally help him get rid of "stage freight" by making presentation to the class. Choosing a topic is one of the most defining moments of seminar process. It is so because there are too many topics to choose from. Additionally for a faculty to see that there is no overlap or duplication of topics is a daunting task. Just imagine class strength of 120 and the process of checking for duplication and even after choosing a topic each student has to come out with an "abstract" of his seminar topic to be approved by the concerned faculty. A seminar abstract to be approved must indicate two or more references consulted during the preparation of the abstract. Until now students were asked to submit the seminar abstract on paper and it was very difficult for a faculty to check all reference. 3.2.2 Our Experiment For the year 2007-08 we adopted a webbased approach to conduct the entire process of seminar. We asked students to submit seminar abstract along with references via email. We insisted that references must be URL's so that we can verify them at once. Submitted abstracts ELELTECH INDIA 2009
were read in email form only and references were checked by clicking through them. Duplicate Seminar topics were detected using "search within mail" feature thus reducing the drudgery usually associated with paper based abstract submission. Once the seminar abstracts were accepted students were asked to prepare up to 15 slides using freely available online presentation tool and submit. Faculty went through the presentation and made suggestion if any and asked students to make the final presentation in the class. Thus paper work was eliminated to 100%. 3.2.3 Outcomes: While our approach simplified our work, it also gave our students to learn using email as means of submitting academic work and also learning using presentation software. The database of all such seminar is maintained is the next batch students are using it as reference. 3.4 Experiment 3: Using web resources to extend class room reach and use web as a channel enhance teaching process. Encouraged by the positive outcome of previous experiment, we decided to explore and integrate more web tools into our teaching process and make students participate in the entire process. For the academic year 2008-09, I am teaching a course Management and Entrepreneurship for the VI semester Computer Science & Engineering branch. The course is a theory course and has 4 hours of weekly teaching. In order to supplement our class room teaching we created the following resources. Management & Entrepreneurship Course Blog: This is the home page of our course and provides resources and links to other resources related to course. The range of resources included class summary that summaries the proceedings of each hour of class room teaching. It also provides links to course syllabus and also recommended and text books. It also has presentations that can be used by student as reference. Management & Entrepreneurship Class Notes: This blog publishes summary of each class room proceedings, updated at the end of each class. The idea behind this blog
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is to provide each student a sort of class notes which he can read as beginning reference. Once he is broadly aware of class proceedings, he can reinforce his understanding by reading and consulting course text book Management and Entrepreneurship Q & A Blog: This is a place where we provide answers to chapter end questions. The idea is to make student aware of possible ways in which questions may be asked in theory exams. It is also intended to be a source to provide model answers. By doing this we hope that student will develop a fair degree of understanding on how to answer questions in university exams. Management and Entrepreneurship Group: A group was created to bring together all students into one communication fold. This forum was used to make course related announcements and make follow up actions. In addition emails and chats were used extensively to support above process. 3.5 Experiment 4: Using online tools to evaluate students. Evaluating students is an integral part of any teaching learning process. Web has no shortage of tools for teachers to use. One such tool that I have used is for conduction of online quizzes. You may see one of them in action at http://ipquiz.blogspot.com/ [6]
We are now pondering over the merits and demerits of approach we have adopted. What were its good aspects/bad aspects; to what extent was our approach helped students. Our initial experience and informal survey among our students indicated that they have been in benefited largely. At present we are planning to extend scope of our experiments in using and integrating web tools into our teaching process.
5. Reference [1] Advanced education uses of web http://class-summary.blogspot.com/ [2] A New Paradigm in Teaching Computer Science Mr Tan Tuck Choy, Aaron, in CDTL Brief: IT In education, October 2001, Vol. 4 No. 4, http://www.cdtl.nus.edu.sg/ Lecturer, School of Computing [3]. http://managementandentrepreneurship.blo gspot.com [4] ACM Curriculum [5] Curriculum Search [6] IP Quizzes accessible at http://ipquiz.blogspot.com/ [7] Using Google Translation tool http://managementandentrepreneurship.blo gspot.com
4. Conclusions and Future works One of the powerful value Propositions of web technologies is their neutrality to three fundamental barriers that have always limited the teacher ability to reach wider audiences: Time, distance and language. In my institution we have number of students whose proficiency in English is lacking. So we have used translation tools to render our class room content in language of their convenience. One such example is seen our Management and Entrepreneurship Class summary Blog where we can render class notes into Hindi [7]. We have also just added audio conversion tool so that students can listen to blog post in addition to reading them [1].
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Keynote Address
Keynote Address Speaker group of the National IT Task force on Human Resource Development. He was chairman of the national board of IT at AICTE
Dr. Deepak B. Phatak is with IIT Bombay since 1971. He served in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering till January 2000 and was the Department head from 1991 to 1994. He also served as the first Dean of Resource Development for IIT Bombay from 1995 to 1998. He was the founding head of Kanwal Rekhi School of Information Technology set up in October 1998 at the Institute. He was appointed to the Subrao Nilekani Chair in the School in January 2000. He headed the S J Mehta School of Management from July 2004 to June 2005. His research interests are in the areas of Data Bases and Information Systems, Software Engineering, System Performance Evaluation, IT enabled Education and IT strategy planning. His primary research inclinations are in Technology application and deployment areas. He is actively involved with initiatives on Smart Cards by the Ministry of Information Technology aimed at proliferate use of these cards in India and was chairman of the national subcommittee that defined the multiapplication smart card standards for Indian payment system. He currently leads the Smart Card research group in KReSIT working on future multi-application smart cards. He has been involved with curriculum development efforts for the undergraduate and postgraduate programs in Indian Universities and has worked on several AICTE and ISTE Committees. He was invited to the working ELELTECH INDIA 2009
At IIT Bombay, he participated in the initial conceptualization and planning of the School of Information Technology with a clearly defined applied research focus of an interdisciplinary nature. The school has developed two unique programs. One is in the form of an IT Business Incubator, which permits young startup teams to build technology companies of the future. The other program offers IT courses to a very large number of people in the country through a unique Distance Education Program using VSATs. Both these initiatives have now matured as regular activities in these two spheres through the Society for INnovation and Entrepreneurship, and the Centre for Distance Engineering Education Program (CDEEP), set up by IIT Bombay. In 2002-2003, Dr. Phatak set up the Affordable Solutions Lab in the school. The lab is engaged in R&D towards development of innovative technologies, applications frameworks, applications, and appliances using which the cost of Solution is significantly reduced. The lab has already produced some innovative solutions adapted by some Indian companies. The lab proposes to extensively use Open Source Software to build such solutions. He believes that in near future, India should become a net “Giver” to the Open Source community. Towards this end, he is setting up a web portal that will facilitate coordinated participation of 30000 student developers across the country in making useful contributions through their final year project work on an annual basis. He is currently engaged in an exercise to set up an
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Keynote Address
Indian forum comprising industry, academia and user organizations to buttress these efforts. He was on a year long sabbatical leave during July 2003 to June 2004 during which he extensively toured the country giving talks to Engineering college students and teachers, and interacting with them to understand the grass root level pulse of the Indian CS and IT education. He is currently writing a book on this experience titled “Indian IT professional for the 21st century”. Dr. Phatak has a long association with Computer Society of India (CSI) spanning over two decades. He was awarded the CSI Fellowship in December 1999. He has also been elected fellow of IETE in March 2000. He is currently the chairman of the Academic committee for CSI. He works closely with NASSCOM on many of their initiatives related to innovation and education. He is a member of the NASSCOM committee for domestic markets and chairs the education subcommittee.
State Bank of India, Reserve Bank of India, Unit Trust of India, Industrial Credit & Investment Corporation of India, Life Insurance Corporation of India, New India Assurance, United India Insurance company, etc. He works on several committees advising Government departments on issues related to IT strategy planning and deployment, and various e-governance projects. Dr. Phatak is currently on the boards of HDFC Asset Management Company, Bank of Baroda, National Institute of Bank Management, Institute for Banking Personnel Selection and National Insurance Academy. Dr. Phatak's dream is to see a resurgent India catching up with the world using Information Technology as the springboard. He hopes to make IT work for the millions of Indians so as to enable them to lead an honorable, comfortable and peaceful life full of love and harmony.
He has been a consultant and advisor for IT related issues to many organizations such as
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Brihaspati-2 : open source e-learning system
Brihaspati-2 system
:
open
source
e-learning
Abstract: What is Brihaspati-2?
Dr.Yatindra Nath Singh IIT Kanpur Dr. Y. N. Singh completed his B. Tech in Electrical Engineering from REC Hamirpur, M. Tech and Ph.D from IIT Delhi. He has worked as Lecturer in E&C dept., University of Roorkee and is currently working as Assistant Professor in EE Dept., Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. Dr. Singh has been conferred with AICTE Young Teacher Award in 2002-03. He is a member of some of the most prestigious scientific societies like IEEE, USA, and IEEE Communication Society and Institution of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineers, India. He is also an executive committee member and Joint Secretary of IEEE UP Section. Some of his ongoing research areas include Optical Packet switching, Agent Based Software Deployment Framework, Development of framework for cooperating mobile agents for NMS applications, Development of OS for Cradle UMS etc.
Brihaspati project started eight years back. At that time, e-learning initiatives were just taking off. World has already seem some of it in limited form. We started this initiative for use in IIT Kanpur, and decided to share it with everybody else. Thus we released the software in opensource. In the beginning, it was a simple system with a simple mechanism to publish some files in a repository and controlled access to students of various courses. Why another LMS? When we started this initiative, there were not many LMSs. Many popular opensource LMS were started at the same time. Earlier to this, there was WebCT. It was written in Perl and consquently had scalability issues. Also free use of WebCT was discontinued at that time. Most of initiatives were based on Java or PHP. We decided to use Java. After some experimentation, we decided on using Turbine framework for implementation. Since then, the development is continuously happenning and this system is coexisting with many other opensource LMSs. In the development of this system, we kept on releasing all the new developments as soon as possible. As a result, we received lot of feedback and suggestions from users of system in IIT Kanpur and other places. Thus users decided the specifications. So far system had been created in such a way that it will be used by a single institute. While developing this system,the focus has been on what people use. The fancy stuff which people are less likely to use is done at
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Brihaspati-2 : open source e-learning system
low priority. During this development, we also felt the need for a live lecture delivery system. The purpose was to emulate the conventional classroom enviroment over existing Internet. The only change is that students and instructor need not be in same room, and number of students can be very large (of the order of millions). Designing such a system was challange when multicast networks are not available. Endsystem multicast or overlay multicast became an option in such situation to build a highly scalable live lecture delivery system.Another major problem is that bandwidth bottlenecks for different users will be different due to hetegenity of Internet. In order to resolve this issue, we decide to adapt layered media architecture. In this lower priority media is dropped when available bandwidth is lower. Each layer of media is transmitted in different multicast group, hence receivers can join or leave multicast groups depending on bandwidth availability. We also had a challange to operate when users can be behind firewalls, NATs or proxies in private IP islands. This problem has been resolved using reflectors.
What
are
the
current
pipeline.
What is planned in future? The project has now been expanded to include few more institutes with the support from NMEICT. They are forming development teams and contributing many other modules as independent services. We are planning to integrate this services in time to come so that with single username and password, users can use all of them and even move between them if the same instance of browsers is used. We are further looking into building p2p based secure file system for storage of all the data across all participating institutes. Now all the services are being converted to multi-institutional system instead of existing single institutional system. The objective is to provide all these tools as services to the academic community of India.
features?
Currently, we have many features. Publishing content, packaging content in SCORM packages, playing SCORM packages. Sharing of content is feasible among users. A content can now be used across multiple courses. Multiple Brihaspati system can interact and get or give feed of material from one to other. In a course, the schedules can be added, quizes can be conducted, groups based activities can be managed. Chat and whiteboard can be used for live interaction. We have recently started working of student tracking system. The real audio-video, slides based classroom can be held with BrihaspatiSync. Currently, people behind NATs and firewalls can participates. Bandwidth estimation and layer add-drop is still not done, but is in
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A 3-tier review model for e-learning modules
A 3-tier modules
review
Dr. Vinod Joshi
model
for
e-learning
Abstract:
SKS MicroFinance, Hyderabad, India
Dr. Uma M Somayajula Independent Consultant, Hyderabad, India
Review is an integral part of the entire elearning development process, and is the key to a successful implementation. The improvements to base e-learning modules, for usability, enhanced features and enhanced interactive and learning capabilities are introduced by effective reviews. Standard traditional reviews either address the need of content, instructional design needs and technology. This is done by experts in various domains. This paper addresses review from a pedagogical perspective, encompassing all the components of learning in a 3-Tier model, which are required to be viewed in conjunction with each other to make elearning reviews effective. This approach parallely builds a capability maturity model for the review process and the reviewer. Skills required by the people involved in creation of e-learning modules are a significant outcome of this model. Index Terms— review, pedagogy, maturity, skills
assessment,
INTRODUCTION The e-learning module development is an iterative process, and so is its review mechanism. The review process should encompass the interdependence of each and every learning objective or activity within the module. It is vital that the review be performed, understanding all relationships between different activities. In this paper, the review process is organized in three tiers with increasing complexity. It starts with the first level which is relatively easier and consists mainly of simple language and navigation checks. The second level brings the instructional design concept into the review mechanism and user interface review. The third level is the most ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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comprehensive one and traces even the learning models and methodologies used. The process starts with the first level which is simple, and moves on to the third level which is more difficult. A pictorial representation of the model is given below:
1
Level 1: Instructionally Sound
2 3
Level 3: Technologically Sound
1. First (Primary) Level Review: This is a simple review which checks the module from outside focusing on how the module appears to the learner. The approach is more of feel good factor rather than any concrete measurement approach. At this level the reviewer goes through the entire module and removes any glitches in the navigation and loading of pages. He also makes simple corrections to the language, like punctuation marks and length of the sentences. At the end of the review a reviewer comes up with a check list of defects which need to be corrected before the module is released. The developer must mark all the points suggested by the reviewer as done. The checks mainly consists of Check Page loading Check each page and see if it is loading properly. Also check the popup and other icons if any. Report the bugs in the predesigned bug report template. Language review Check for simple language mistakes including capitalization, punctuation marks, braking of sentences and incomplete sentences. This check also includes format checking and font size space between words etc.
from it. This check ensures working of all the buttons or icons and their functionality. This also checks naming of the buttons and association with its functionality. This is very important if the navigation is not linear. Transition review This review step checks the continuation of content when screens are transitioning from one screen to another. It also checks the transition to the message box or pop up windows. Is the transition smooth and is continuity maintained or there are breaks some where? This process also checks the chunking of content appropriately. Quality of images Check if the images are nice and of proper size and not hazy. Consider sharp edges and also consider copyright violation issues. Are the images visually pleasing? Also check the color of the background (requirements if any) and colors of the buttons and icons for consistency. Is the image placed at the correct position and size of the image is also checked. Popup and other add-ons in the module Check each pop up and find if it adds value to the content. Read the popup and check if they are appropriate to the positioning. Also check if the pop up comes at right position. Consistency Check if the font size, positioning of the content, space between the words, type of font used is uniform. Are the sizes of graphics area consistent? At the end of the first level the reviewer comes up with the review report and related explanation if any. The developer needs to incorporate the review changes and seek clarification if any observations are not clear. In few cases there is a template which captures all the bugs and need to submit a bug report. The review template format (Fig.1) and reviewer report format (Fig 2) are given below.
Navigation review This is to check the buttons and see if the navigation does exactly what is expected ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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A 3-tier review model for e-learning modules
Fig 1: Review Template S.No Review Revie Develo Remar wer per ks 1 Page loading 2
Language check
3
Navigation check
4
Transition check
5
Image quality
6
Pop-ups & addons Consistency
7
Fig 2: Reviewer Report Format Ch1 Ch2 Ch3 Ch4 Ch5 Ch6 Ch7 Misc
Screen No xxx Screen No xxx Screen No xxx Screen No xxx 1.1 Skills needed from a reviewer for the first level: The review at this stage can be done by any one who is fluent in the language and knows how to navigate through an e-learning course. He/she must understand the functionality of the icons. He/she must have an eye for fine details. 2. Second (Secondary) Level Review: Assumption: It is assumed that the module is already reviewed using the guidelines of the first level. Second level is more comprehensive and elaborates on the points suggested in the first level. In this review, main checks are related to Instructional objectives, Instructional graphics, Instructional assessments and Instructional writing fundamentals. The second level includes
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Learning objectives Verify its learning objectives are properly written and whether they are achieved at the end of the course. Check for consistency and sufficiency of the objectives. Check if all the objectives are reflected at the end of the course achievements. Consider at what level of bloom are the learning objectives written and, are assessments designed keeping in mind the level. User interface review Are the icons well designed and easy to understand in their functionality? Are the icons placed at the appropriate location which convinces the human thinking process? How user friendly are the icons and how about human interaction with them? These need to be tested. Does the user understand with out giving any hint what to do with an icon and its functionality? The reviewer with out the help of the team takes the course and notes down his observations and difficulties faced. The basics are from human computer interactions. The course has to be actually taken by a totally new person and his movements are to be observed. Language style, grammar Check the grammar and the language style. Read each screen and check if every sentence is written in active voice and written in first person. Is the tone of the entire passage positive and easily understood? Delete all high sounding jargon and ensure that each word mentioned is either explained or defined earlier. Not more than five bullet points in one screen. Length of the sentence should not be very long and break them into two sentences. Check all pronouns and their usage. While reading a passage no parallel construction should appear. Clear the dead wood (unnecessary usage of words or those repetitive in nature). Any statement mentioned must be properly justified and no conclusion must be drawn. Justify any conclusion with proper support. Check also for contextualization of the language for US audience, delete any gender bias and
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religious bias in the language. It must not sound racial. Relationship between content and graphics Picture must be worth a thousand words. Are the graphics instructionally sound? Does the graphic in some way relate to the content appearing on the screen? Do they add any value in learning? Are images just ornamental in nature? Check for any kind of gender bias or religious/regional bias in the images. Appropriateness of popup Check each popup use with their relationship to the content. How do they add value to the content and what is their nature? Is too much of content there in a popup. Relevance of answers to quiz Check the design of the questions and quiz either at the end of the module or during the module. Take into consideration learning objectives, and are the questions designed to match with the level mentioned. Does the number of questions span the entire course? Check for appropriateness of the design of the question. Validate each question for the respective style. Heading and sub heading relevance Verify the metaphor used for the screen in the form of heading. Is the heading appropriate, interesting and helps a learner in remembering the points learnt? Heading must some way reflect entire content of the page and has relationship with the graphic on the page. Technical review Is the content technically current and correct? Verify the validity from the base content used. Any wrong interpretations or approach described shall be checked. 2.2. Skills needed from a reviewer for the second level: To review a document at the second level the reviewer must be familiar with − Basics of human machine interaction − Designing user interfaces ELELTECH INDIA 2009
− − − − −
Recognizing & deleting inconsistency Basics of designing principles Fluency in the written language with emphasis on grammar and style. Able to write down learning objectives and review them Check learning objectives with end objectives and are they achieved
3. Third (Tertiary) Level Review: This level of review is the traditional model for an intensive re-check, as the requirements are met first, in the secondary review. − Instructional review − Graphics instructional review − Chunking of information − Learning review − Design of quiz (questions review) − Instructional language − OS and hardware independent − Learning objectives and attainment of each objective Learning scaffolding review In this case a learning scaffolding informs that a story line is used while preparing the module which bring coherence in learning. Reviewer must be able to check if the underlying model used is appropriate and accurate. Instructional design models In this case an appropriate learning model is used for the learning to take place. The reviewer must understand the model and see if it is properly applied while the course is prepared. Learning approach The reviewers must also check how the learning is achieved like learn by doing, learn by experimentation or exploration etc. 3.2 Skills needed from a reviewer for the third level: To review a module at this level the reviewer must be well versed in instructional design and learning theory and models. He must have clear idea how
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learning takes place and does the model facilitates the learning Conclusion Holistically reviewing the module with a constant connect to the objectives of the course, with increasing levels of maturity, builds a framework that value adds not only to the review process, the e-learning module, but also the reviewer. This model is a collection of all the review checks in one place and can be used for enhancing the learning of the reviewer as well. REFERENCES 1. Principles of Instructional design, Robert Gagne 2. Badrul H Khan & Vinod Joshi, J. Creative Communications 1:1 (2006)
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Learnability Testing of Online Courses
Learnability Testing of Online Courses Abstract:
Archana Naryana Kern Learning Solutions Pvt. Ltd. Ms. Archana Naryana works with Kern Learning Solutions Pvt. Ltd., Secundrabad. She has four years of experience as an instructional designer. She has designed elearning and instructor-led training programs for varied domains such as neuromedical science, nursing, communication, performance engagement, banking, usability, counseling, grooming, personality development and so on. Her main focus has always been understanding the psyche of learners and their intrinsic and extrinsic motivations.
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At Kern Learning Solutions, we have a unique testing process to evaluate an online course before its final release. We call this “learnability testing”. The aim is to ensure that all obstacles that hinder learnability are spotted and removed. In this paper, we will discuss how this testing process is different from testing conducted by other eLearning companies. Learnabilty testing is a comprehensive process that tests the instructional strategies used and the usability of the online course. We will look at how this testing is conducted. Index Terms— Learnability, concept, instructional strategy
usability,
INTRODUCTION Let’s take a minute to understand how testing happens in typical elearning companies. Testing of a software application helps spot technical errors, programming bugs, and other functionality issues. A clean chit from the testing department ensures that a bug-free course is released. However, is this sufficient to certify that the course is effective? Shouldn’t you test the effectiveness of the instructional approaches used? How about evaluating whether the instructional design maps to the needs of the learners? How do you check whether the course ensures effective learning or not? Today, most elearning companies believe that mimicking the testing mechanism used by software companies is the most effective testing methodology. What they fail to consider is that the testing objectives for a software application and an elearning application are very different. The main objective of testing a software application is to ensure smooth functionality, efficiency, and usability. However, the main objective of testing an elearning application is to check how “learnable” the course is. Learnability
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testing is designed specifically to evaluate the effectiveness of a learning program. Most IDs resist concept testing of their courses by learners. What are the common misconceptions of instructional designers, graphic designers, and/or programmers?
The course is extremely intuitive. This is probably the most common misconception. There are interfaces that look simple but are highly unintuitive. On the other hand, there are complex interfaces that only confuse the learner. Learnability testing checks to see whether the course is truly intuitive. There are no bugs in my course. During a quality assurance check (QA), we look at the course sequentially with a specific goal. Even if you think you have tried everything, learnability testing shows how real learners will use the course. This may open your eyes to a few bugs. We have provided every feature that the learner needs. Let the learners confirm this. After learnability testing, you may either discover that there are certain features that the learner will never use or that he/she is looking for a feature that you have overlooked. You may also discover that the learner simply cannot find certain features! The graphics are attractive and pleasing to the eye. Learnability testing helps us understand if graphic image are selfexplanatory or not. You may realize that there are a few images that do not aid learning. The content has been double checked for accuracy by the SME and client. The subject matter expert (SME), client, and all other others involved in the development life cycle (DLC) may look at the course from the learner’s point of view. However, during learnability testing, you may realize that the learner’s experiences are different and they are unable to relate to the content. SME and client at times give you information as ELELTECH INDIA 2009
they ought to exist and not how they are in reality. The instructional strategies used are engaging and motivating. Let the learner tell you this. There are certain strategies such as games, simulations, branching stories that overwhelm the learner, while others leave them bored. It is important to understand how they respond to the strategy used. G. The course has covered the organizational and learning objectives. It is equally important to know whether you are able to meet these objectives. Does your course have the desired effect? Learnability testing is inspired by usability testing. In simple words, usability testing is a controlled experiment that tests how well people use a particular product. The user performs a series of tasks while the observer watches him and takes notes. Usability testing is conducted at several stages and feedback is implemented to refine the design. At Kern, we modified this testing methodology to test elearning courses. Where usability testing checks whether a product is ‘usable’, learnability testing checks whether an elearning application is ‘learnable’. A course is ‘learnable’ if it fulfills the following criteria: • Is the learner motivated to finish the course? Is the course engaging? • Do the instructional strategies interest the learner? Simply put, does the learner ‘get’ the theme? • Is the instructional flow clear to the learner? Is the learner comfortable with the content? • Is the course free of obstacles (too much audio, too much text, bugs, navigational errors and so on) that may hinder learning? • Is the course usable? Detailed Learnability Testing Process Learnability can be divided into two broad categories: concept testing and usability testing.
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Fig. 1. Learnability testing as a process. Concept Testing Concept testing can be carried out during the design phase and the development phase. At Kern, we carry out concept testing on wire frames to ensure that we are in sync with the learner’s needs. During the design phase, we recruit learners and ask them to take the course in the wire frame format. We do not check functionality at this phase. You can conduct concept as many times as you feel necessary during the design phase. If you have done your research accurately, one round of concept testing will suffice. During the development phase, concept testing is conducted as part of the learnability process. i. Instructional Strategy: The questions we ask ourselves are: -- Is the learner showing interest in taking the course? -- Is the learner motivated to read information? -- Does the learner ‘understand’ and ‘relate’ to the theme used? Given below is a screen shot of a wire frame. The learners were software developers and the main objective of the course was to help the learner understand the importance of usability and provide tips that he can use in his day-to-day work.
Fig. 2. Example of instructional strategy during concept testing. After storyboarding, Kern arranged a concept testing using the wire frame. We recruited software developers and asked them to take the course. The concept testing opened our eyes to several things. If we had not conducted a test at this phase and gone ahead with development, we would have had an ineffective product. The main learning from the concept testing were: 1. The learners did not use Web 2.0 tools to collaborate. They were not confident about sharing their knowledge and did not see value in it. 2. Most exercises in this course were open ended to ensure that the learner had the space to think his answers out. He had to type in their response in most cases. The learner was not sufficiently motivated to type out his answers. 3. The learner found a particular module very basic and wished to have more examples from his dayto-day life. 4. The learner was still not able to grasp the importance of usability. ii. Content: It is important to check what the learner thinks about the content and its coverage. Is she looking more information? Does she feel that there is too much information? We must find out whether the learner is able to relate to the scenarios, examples, and so on used in the course. Is
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Learnability Testing of Online Courses
the learner able to understand the content? Is the learner comfortable with the language used? We had designed a course for a leading bank. The learners were call center executives who primarily took calls and used a software application to enter data. During concept testing, we realized that we had used the term ‘tagging a call’ which the learners were unfamiliar with. Even though, this was provided by the SME, this phrase confused the learners. We learnt that the common lingo used at the workplace was ‘marking a call’. iii. Audio: Learnability testing has shown us that different learner profiles react differently to audio. Therefore, audio is always an element we are eager to test. Testing helps us identify the right dose of audio. It helps us find answers for the following: a) Is the audio sufficient on each screen? b) Is the learner distracted by audio? c) Does the learner avoid reading text because of audio? d) What is the learner’s reaction to the pace of the audio? e) Is the transcript (if used) useful? Does the learner point out any discrepancies in language? During concept testing for the course on Dealing with Conflict at the Workplace, we realized that the learners read the on screen text much faster than the audio. Therefore, they found the audio very distracting. Several learners start pointing out discrepancies in the audio and the on screen text. Therefore, learning was affected as they were distracted. iv. Exercises: It is important to check whether the learner is applying the knowledge they have gained. How do they respond to exercises? Do the exercises challenge them? Do the learners find the exercises motivating? Is the learner comfortable with the feedback received? Concept testing helps us find the answers for this. Given below is a screen shot from a course we designed for a leading IT company. The learners were middle level managers. ELELTECH INDIA 2009
This course was meant as a refresher and the main objective was to standardize the performance engagement process across the organization.
Fig. 2. Example of exercise during concept testing. During concept testing, we realized that while attempting the exercises, the learners were very confused with the feedback. We had not used the standard ‘That’s correct’ and ‘That’s incorrect!’ format. Therefore, the learners were unable to tell whether they had got the answer right or not and were dissatisfied with the exercises. Usability Testing Usability testing can be conducted during the development phase and at the end of the DLC, i.e. when the alpha version is rolled out. The main objective is to test the usability of the eLearning course. Are there any usability issues in the course? The categories covered under this are discussed below. i. Navigation: Is the learner able to find his way through the course? Are the Next and Back buttons positioned at the right place? Is the navigation intuitive? Given below is a screen shot from a course we designed for a leading IT company. The learners were middle level managers. This course was meant as a refresher and the main objective was to standardize the performance engagement process across the organization. In this particular screen, each element is clickable. If you click a particular topic, you are taken to the corresponding sub screens related to this topic. After viewing the sub-
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screens of the topic, you will be brought back to the same screen with the topic previously visited dulled out.
Fig. 2. Example of learner interface during usability testing. Fig. 2. Example of navigation during usability testing. During usability testing, as expected learners selected the topics in a random fashion. What had missed our eyes during our QA crept up during learnability testing. The learners realized that the page numbering was jumbled up. This was because they were viewing the topics in random while the numbering had been done in a linear fashion. The numbering therefore, confused the learner. ii. Learner Interface: It is important to find out if all elements (icons, buttons, and so on) on the interface are intuitive. Does the learner use all the elements provided on the interface? Is the learner searching for a particular feature such as Pause or Mute? Does the learner find the interface confusing or easy to use? How often does the learner use the features such as Mute, Pause, References and so on? We get answers to these questions through usability testing. Given below is a screen shot from a course Dealing With Conflict at the Workplace. The learners were middle level managers. This course had audio that read the text off the screen.
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During usability testing, we realized that the learners immediately looked for Mute to turn off the audio. Since the audio read the text off the screen, they were distracted by the audio and preferred to read the text at their own pace. We also realized that the learner never used Resources and the Glossary. iii. Affordance: Does the learner click all the clickable icons? Did she click any element that was not clickable? Does the learner rely on instruction text to carry out a particular action? Did the learner complete all tasks on a screen before moving ahead? Given below is a screen shot from a course we designed for Godrej Lifespace. The learners were customer service executives who required training in grooming skills and personality development.
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Fig. 2. Example of affordance during usability testing. During usability testing, we realized that even though the Menu was default open, the learner did not know where she needed to click to begin the course. Most learners asked the observers what they had to do to proceed further. We had to include an instruction text to ensure that the learner knew where to begin. Conducting Learnability Testing As discussed earlier, learnablity testing includes both concept testing and usability testing. Therefore, this test is typically conducted towards the end of the development phase or on the alpha version of the course. We decide the number of learners who need to go through the course (sample size) and recruit these learners. The sample size depends on the overall size of the target audience. If it is a smaller group of say, 50 learners, a sample size of seven should be sufficient. We request the clients to give us access to their employees. We then identify the learners based on the target audience defined at the beginning of the project. If the learners are remote or inaccessible, we recruit individuals who have a similar profile. While doing this, we keep in mind cultural diversities. Set up At the learner’s workplace: We, typically, seek permission to conduct learnability testing in the workplace at the learner’s workstation. Therefore, we get to ELELTECH INDIA 2009
test the eLearning course in the learner’s real work environment. This requires two observers, a video camera, notebooks/pens, and audio recorder. The observers must be fluent in the learner’s preferred language. Research Lab: Alternatively, we also set up the test in our research lab. We recruit learners and ask them to take the eLearning course in a controlled environment. We have a one-way mirror, a video camera, TV, two or more observers, (if required) and notebooks/pens. We opt for this when we recruit individuals who resemble the learner profiles. We also suggest you use this technique for high end courses that requires higher degree of observation. The observer sits on the right of the learner and slightly behind the learner. This gives the learner his space and ensures that his personal space is not invaded. It is important that he feels comfortable during the testing process. Introduction We begin the learnability testing by introducing ourselves to the learners. We brief him about the objective of process. We clearly state the expectations. This part is extremely important as it sets stage for the rest of the process. A sample introduction is given below. “My name is Archana and I work with Kern Learning Solutions Pvt. Ltd. I will show you the draft design of an elearning program that will help you learn grooming skills and personality development. I need your help to evaluate how well the course is designed. We really appreciate your participation. As a token of appreciation, here is a small gift.(pause) Please go through the course as if you are going through it as a part of your work. If you are able to go through it without hitches, we know that the course is designed well. However, if you face any trouble, we will know that design needs more work. This is a test of the COURSE. And, it is NOT a test of YOUR abilities. So if you can’t proceed at any point of time, don’t worry. It just means the course can be designed better and needs more work. I will just observe you from behind and I want you to complete the course. As we’re
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learning, please think out loud. You can take a short break in between if you want. Remember to tell me what you’re looking at, why you choose a button or link, and what you expect. Any questions? (pause) Let’s start.” It is extremely important to let the learner know that we are not testing his abilities and that there is no pressure to take the test. If the learner is not interested in participating, he is free to leave. This helps put him at ease and he will share feedback freely. Our aim is to build a rapport with the learner and let him understand the importance of his feedback. We brief him on how the testing will be conducted and inform him that the entire session will be recorded (audio/video).
Observation We then observe the learner as she takes the course. We encourage the learner to voice her thoughts by asking them ‘what are you looking for?’ or ‘is something wrong?’ We also note down our individual observations. We record time spent on each screen, actions performed, comments made, and so on. We design a protocol to ensure that we keep the crucial aspects of concept testing and usability testing in our minds while observing the learner’s actions.
Post-test Questionnaire This exercise takes about ten to fifteen minutes. After taking the course, we ask the learner to reflect on his/her learning experience. We ask a series of questions using a post-test questionnaire. The questions asked are neutral in nature. We note the learner’s feedback. Learner feedback is valuable as it can be used as a yardstick to assess the course. Some of the questions included in this questionnaire are: • What is your overall impression about the course? • Do you think the way the concepts were explained helped you understand the concepts better?
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• •
Were you able to relate to the scenarios and characters in the course? How would you rate the course on the basis of its look and feel?
Fig. 2. Example of a post-test questionnaire. Ensure that you have a list of crisp, relevant questions to ask your learners. Avoid asking for their suggestions, especially in terms of content accuracy and strategies used. The more comfortable the learner is, the more honest she will be while answering these questions.
Analysis and Results In this step, we collate all the data recorded during the testing phase in an excel sheet. We then look for common trends and patterns across the sample size. We identify the common problems that learner faced during the observation. Remember, all issues mentioned by the learner are not fixed. Only those issues that are common across the sample size are fixed. This ensures that the major hitches in the course are tackled before its final release. We categorize the list of issues and suggest changes based on priority. We then send the final list of fixes to the technical team.
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• •
Don’t ask the learner for suggestions on instructional strategies and content presentation. Don’t sit too close to the learner.
Conclusion
Fig. 2. Example of a report generated after analysis of findings from learnability testing.
Revision of Courses The technical team starts fixing the issues in the course as suggested in the final list. The issues with the highest priority are fixed. The value-adds are fixed keeping in mind client requirements, beta release date, feasibility, effort involved, and so on. Remember, the objective of this step is not to beautify the course. The main goal is to remove or minimize all obstacles that hinder the learning process. If you do a concept testing using wire frames, it will reduce the rework that may be involved at a later stage. You will be able to identify obstacles that hinder learning much earlier in the process.
Points to Remember While conducting learnability testing, keep the following in mind. • Avoid jotting down the your personal comments or opinions. Note down observations in terms of ‘The learner is looking around and changing positions constantly’ rather than ‘The learner is bored.’ • Do not prompt or assist the learner. Allow the learner to identify the way out. If you feel that he are lost, ask him to voice his concerns out aloud. • If the learner criticizes something, don’t justify or argue. Simply, note it down. • Don’t ask leading questions to the learner.
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Typically, the client goes through the alpha version of the online course and provides feedback based on what he thinks is good for the learners. This is plugged into the course and the beta version of the course is rolled out. After implementation, the learners are asked to take the course. As the learner takes the course, she encounters certain difficulties. The feedback from learners is poor and it is too late to make changes to the program. The client is upset with elearning companies for not doing their jobs. Learnability testing allows the learner to take the complete course before the final release. Learnability testing of an online course has the following benefits: • This testing is conducted in an objective and scientific manner. • It helps identify major road blocks and obstacles to learning. • It gives a quick trailer of how a learner will respond to your course. • The feedback is based on learner behavior and not client’s interpretation of learner behavior. • We can guarantee learning effectiveness and learner motivation. • It acts as a last and final check to ensure that your course is on the right track and no surprises spring up later. • Learners and clients are involved much earlier in the process. Therefore, the chance of getting it right increases drastically. Learnability testing ensures that we, as learning companies, take responsibility for effectiveness of a course. We should be able to give a guarantee of effectiveness rather than deliver a course and then, forget about it. Testing an elearning course is the most humbling experience. We see things that we
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Learnability Testing of Online Courses
haven’t seen before. I would suggest that instructional designers conduct the learnability testing as they will be more tuned to the learner’s needs. It is a complete eye-opener. It is very satisfying to know that we have tried 100% to ensure that our learner enjoys the learning experience. We should stop assuming things on the part of the learner and give the learner an opportunity to have her say. The end product will then be extremely high in quality, relevant to the learner, interesting, and motivating.
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Quality Metrics in E-education
Quality Metrics in E-education
Dr. Saroj Kumar Lenka Sasmita Nayak Techno School Bhubaneswar
Krupajal Group of Institutions, Orissa (Engineering
College),
Ms. Sasmita Nayak is presently working as Assistant Professor in Mechanical Engineering Department of Techno School (Engineering College), Bhubaneswar, Orissa, India. She has experience in industry, teaching and research. She is presently pursuing her research work on “Soft computing in Environmental Management”. She is editorial board member for International Journal of Computer Science and Management Systems.
Alok Ranjan Sahoo NM Institute of Engineering & Technology, Bhubaneswar
Dr. Saroj Kumar Lenka worked as Principal for AITAM School of Computer Science and Management, and Mitra Institute of Technology, Andhra Pradesh, India. Now he is professor in Krupajal Group of Institutions, Orissa. He is Doctoral Scrutiny Committee member of Sikhsa O Anusandhan University, India. He is editorial board member for five International journals and editor-in-chief for International Journal of Computer Science and Management Systems. He is life member of the Institution of Engineers (India), life Member of the ISTE-AICTE, life member of Bioinformatics Organization Inc., Hodson, Massachusetts. He is in research since more than ten years.
Alok Ranjan Sahoo is presently working as Asst. Professor in Computer Science Engineering department, NM Institute of Engineering & Technology, Bhubaneswar, Orissa, India. He obtained B.E. degree in Computer Science and Engineering from Utkal University, Bhubaneswar, India in 1995 and M.Tech Computer Science degree from Utkal University, Bhibaneswar, Orissa, India. He has 14 years of experience in teaching and research. Presently He is pursuing Ph.D. work in Data Mining registered under SOA University,Bhubaneswar,India.
Abstract: ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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Quality Metrics in E-education
The objective of e-education is to provide e-teaching and e-learning experiences to anyone, anytime, anywhere. This eeducation method can be provided to teachers, trainers and learners in offcampus, on-campus, virtual campus, online and e-learning modes. E-degrees and ecertificates will be provided through online and electronic mode. Working hours for eeducation is 24x7, that is round the clock. All the room of the e-learning house should electronically equipped. E-learning and eeducation will be more prominent in the complete e-world. New e-learning solutions reflect its ongoing commitment for helping faculty, students, researchers, and administrators at higher educational institutions. Virtual classroom solutions are highly effective alternatives to traditional teaching and learning methods to empower instructors to deliver richer, more interactive learning experiences to students in class room, across campus, and throughout the world. New rapid e-learning solutions empower higher education institutions of all kinds and sizes to provide faculty, students, and other learners with high-impact online learning that is instantly accessible. E-learning will create a world class education at the fingertips. Reform in e-education requires a vision i.e. where we want to be. It also speaks of a solid foundation and effective strategies to reach our objective. Standards are major components of quality assurance for elearning. With the introduction of best curriculum in our e-schools and e-institute, we can create, implement, and strengthen an e-education curriculum that benefits our youth, our communities, and our economy. In this paper we have proposed Defect Removal Efficiency (DRE) can be used for measuring the efficiency of the system. The defect removal can be done at various stages of e-education. By extrapolating the DRE metrics to released system such as an e-school or e-institute we can measure the effectiveness of their quality assurance process based on the number of defects found in the system before and after its implementation.
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Keywords: E-education, Quality Assurance, Defect Removal Efficiency 1. Introduction This paper emphasizes on Statistical Quality Control (SQC), where consists of statistical process control, process capability studies, acceptance sampling and design of experiments are very important tools to obtain, maintain and improve the quality level of goods and services produced by an organization. Despite its importance, and the fact that it is taught in technical and general courses, as well as in corporate training sectors, SQC has been largely misused. An inappropriate teaching approach may be the cause of such problem. Therefore it has motivated the development of a model for SQC teaching, allowing its learners to correctly apply SQC techniques. After a survey regarding the concept needed to correctly apply SQC, its use and teaching/training methods, the model's contents and methodology were defined. We also realized the opportunity of incorporating a computer environment for the model, permitting the practice of the needed SQC concepts and skills. An Artificial Intelligence approach was used to develop the computer environment, resulting in an Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS), the STCEQ. The paper discusses the main characteristics of the system, its functioning, benefits of using such a system and the results we obtained while using this system. The standards for quality assurance were originally developed in connection with production oriented industry. However, they are also being increasingly employed in service-oriented activities and public and private educational institutions specifically, and are being revised and supplemented with education and training in mind. Often the use of quality standards is combined with ideas taken from Total Quality Management (TQM) philosophy. Total quality management is usually associated with an extensive effort to focus the whole organisation and its mode of operation on the users needs, with a continuous monitoring and improvement of the performance of the organisation.
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Over the past ten years, the software reuse and software engineering communities have come to better understanding on component-based software engineering. A good software reuse process facilitates the increase of productivity, quality, and reliability, and the reduction in cost and implementation time [1]. An initial investment is required to start a software reuse process, but that investment is recovered in the long run after few reuses. In short, the development of a reuse process and repository produces a base of knowledge that improves in quality after every reuse, minimizing the amount of development work required for future projects. It ultimately reduces the risk of new projects that are based on repository knowledge [2]. In this context, we have introduced defect removal efficiency which can be used as quality metrics to develop a quality education system. The proposed system is being developed to detect and analyse defects. The removal of later can be done through various stages of the Quality Engineering Education Life Cycle (QELC) [3]. This proposed system developed can be used across the globe. This unique proposed system is simple, efficient and easy to use for detect, analysis and prediction of measuring quality in e-education. It also advises to control the quality metrics in eeducation.
2. E-education: The objective of this paper is to deliver e-teaching and E-learning experiences to anyone, anytime, anywhere. The major components for e-learning solutions for higher education are email, e-chat, SMS, TV channels, education satellites, white pages, yellow pages, web sites and radio channels such as FM, AM. Typically the difficult methods of providing e-learning through programming and multimedia and its skill person are more useful in recent times. This e-learning method can be provided to teachers, trainers and learners in off campus, on campus, virtual campus, online and e-learning modes. And e-degrees and ecertificates will be provided through online and electronically mode. This learning
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duration is 24 hours and environment should be 24x7 learning. All the rooms of the elearning house should be e-rooms. In feature most of the people may give more importance to e-learning. E-learning will be more prominent to the tomorrow’s world i.e. complete e-world. New e-learning solutions reflect its ongoing commitment to helping faculty, students, researchers, and administrators at higher education institutions. These creates virtual classroom solutions are highly effective alternatives to traditional teaching and learning methods, empower instructors to deliver richer, more interactive learning experiences to students in class, across campus, and throughout the world. New rapid e-learning solutions empower higher education institutions of all kinds and sizes to provide instantly accessible high-impact online learning to faculty, students and other learners. E-learning creating a world class education at the fingertips.
3. Quality Assurance In many areas of the society in industry, public administration and the service sector we have in recent years witnessed a rapidly growing interest on matters of quality. In industry, quality control is a well-known phenomenon, i.e. manufactured goods are inspected and then either approved or rejected on the basis of well-defined specifications. A high percentage of errors mean that production is not cost-effective. Thus, quality control gives rise to a need for quality assurance i.e. routines and systems so that the manufactured goods meet the specified quality standards. Quality is most often defined 'fitness for purpose' related to the needs of the user/customer (Juran 1988). Rather quality depends upon purpose of that specific operation. In education the customer is not always easily identified. In public education the government pays, the immediate user is the student, secondary users are employers (e.g. SMEs) etc. Quality, thus, is a value judgment interpreted by different stakeholders, government, teachers, administrators, students, employers etc. On
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Quality Metrics in E-education
the other hand, to assure and assess quality we must have a clear notion of what it is. Another definition could be that the ‘product comply with defined requirements’. Consequently, purpose and requirements, then, should be defined by the significant stakeholders, i.e. not only the SMEs. Birnbaum (1989) has stressed this diversity and for instance pointed out three dimensions of quality in higher education is the meritocratic, the social individualistic. The meritocratic is the institution's conformity to professional and scholarly norms with the academic profession as reference group. The social is the degree to which the institutions satisfy the needs of important collective constituents. An individualistic is the contribution to the institution makes to the personal growth of students. A specific interesting view concerning emphasis on the individualistic aspect of elearning quality is presented by Ehlers (2004), who argues that of all the dimensions and aspects of e-learning quality the perspective of the learner is probably the most important. E-education differs from other products in that education or learning is not a product that the consumer buys. According to Ehlers, e-learners’ subjective quality requirements can be structured into seven fields of quality tutor support, collaboration, technology, costexpectation benefits, information transparency of course provider, course structure, didactics. According to differences in preferences learners are divided into four different groups’ individualistic e-learners, result-oriented elearners, pragmatic e-learners, avantgardism e-learners. In industry, a firm that can document an effective quality assurance system will be easily able to inspire confidence as a supplier of goods. This is one of the reasons why national and international standards for quality assurance have been issued. It is illustrating, for instance, that in the newly introduced quality and accreditation system of Norway, a two stage cycle was decided for the institutional accreditation process. Before being accepted for an external evaluation procedure, the institutions were ELELTECH INDIA 2009
required to have an approved quality assurance system in place (ENQA 2004, Di Nauta et al. 2004). At present in Indian academic system UGC, AICTE, DEC, MCI, DCI, etc. are accreditation bodies of the educational institutions for education and eeducations. International standards often do not define the products’ quality, but describe the requirements that ought to be followed for quality systems. The quality specifications are set by the individual firm, or jointly by the firm and a contract partner, in our system this would be between the supplier of e-learning and an SME as customer. The standards for quality assurance were originally developed in connection with production oriented industry. However, they are also being increasingly specifically employed in service-oriented activities and public and private educational institutions and are being revised and supplemented with education and training in mind. Often the use of quality standard is combined with ideas taken from Total Quality Management (TQM) philosophy. Total quality management is usually associated with an extensive effort to focus the whole organisation and its mode of operation on the users’ needs and again with a continuous monitoring and improvement of the quality of the organisation’s performance. Since 1986-87 the series of ‘International Standards’ (ISO 9000 series) have been an important starting point in the endeavour to achieve higher quality. Some other important concepts are ’quality control’, ‘quality assurance’, ‘quality management’ and ‘quality assessment’. Quality control is defined in technical environments as: ’the operational techniques and activities that are used to fulfill the requirements for quality’ (ISO 8402) [4]. Van Vucht & Westerheijden’s statement concerning (higher) education the term also includes the state control strategy concerning quality (now illustrated specifically by the ‘Quality Assurance Agencies’ established in most European countries). Quality assurance is ‘all the planned and systematic actions necessary to provide adequate confidence’ Quality management is defined as that aspect of the overall
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management function that determines and implements the quality policy.
4. E-education Quality Assurance: The increasing emphasis on quality measures has prompted the need for better e-education quality management using data driven and statistical methods. Various measures of development and released software quality have been created to make the process measurable, repeatable, and continuously improving. The proposed Defect Removal Efficiency (DRE) is one of the metrics used for measuring the efficiency of e-education by doing defect removal at various stages of the Quality Eeducation Life Cycle (QELC). We have already proposed Defect Removal Efficiency (DRE) is one of the metrics used for measuring the efficiency of engineering education by doing defect removal at various stages of the Quality engineering education Life Cycle (QELC) [3]. By extrapolating the DRE metric to released products, an e-education organization can measure the effectiveness of their quality assurance process based on the number of defects found in the system before and after its implementation or study. The paper also analyzes the effect of various parameters on the metric, which unearths more meaning from the metric value. Reform in e-education requires a vision of where we want to be, a solid foundation, and effective strategies to reach our objective. Standards are major components of quality assurance in e-education. Education curriculum standards are the foundation, identifying what is essential for students to master in each of the industry sectors. With their placement, our e-schools and e-colleges can create, implement, and strengthen an e-education curriculum that benefits our youth, our communities, and our economy. Career e-education is a vital component of public education in any country. A career pathway is a coherent sequence of rigorous academic courses that allow students to apply academics and develop technical and non-technical skills in a curricular area. Career pathways prepare students for successful completion of state ELELTECH INDIA 2009
academic and technical standards and more advanced post-secondary course work related to the career in which they are interested.
5. Proposed E-education Life Cycle (QELC) The proposed classic Defect Removal Efficiency (DRE) calculation has been successfully used to determine the efficiency of the defect removal process at various stages of the quality e-education life cycle. A. System Reuse System reuse [6,7] is the process of implementing or updating the existing eeducation systems using education system reuse assets. System assets, or components, include all system products, from requirements and proposals, to specifications and designs and to finally user manuals and test suites. Anything that is produced from a system development effort can potentially be reused. Reuse can be achieved through different modes. Compositional reuse involves constructing new systems by assembling existing reusable assets, while generative reuse involves the use of application generators to build new applications from high level descriptions. B. Proposed Defect Removal Efficiency The proposed DRE is a measure of the filtering ability of quality assurance and control activities as they are applied throughout all process framework activities. The computation of DRE can be done as follows [5, 8]. DRE=E / (E+D) where E is the number of errors found before implementation of e-education system of the e-schools, e-colleges or einstitutes to the end-user. D is the number of defects found after establishment. The ideal value of DRE is 1. As E increases for a given value of D, the overall value of DRE begins to approach number 1.0. We can also define:
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DRE as DRE i = E i / (E i + E i+1) Where Ei is the number of errors found during ith e-education activity and E i+1 is the number of errors found during the eeducation activity i+1 those were not discovered in the activity i. The errors that are not found during the review of the analysis phase are passed on to the design phase. Fig.1 shows the defect removal process during Quality E-education Life Cycle (QELC).
Fig. 1 Defect Removal Process during QELC
6. Standards for Quality Assurance Standards are major components of quality assurance in e-education. Academic curriculum standards are the foundation, identifying what is essential for e-education students to master in each of the industry sectors. With their placement, our technical and non-technical schools and colleges can create, implement, and strengthen an academic course curriculum that benefits our youth, our communities, and our economy. Career e-education is a vital component of public education in any country. A career pathway is a coherent sequence of rigorous academic, professional and technical courses that allows students to apply academics and develop professional technical, non-technical skills in a curricular area. Career pathways prepare students for successful completion of state academic and technical standards and more advanced postsecondary course work related to the career in which they are interested. Standards for quality assurance are based in research, it describes what to teach, not
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how to teach it, these are a continuing commitment for excellence in e-education.
7. Conclusion: Standards analyse National and International competition in a market economy which affects goods and services produced and the quality, quantity, and cost of that e-education. Standards explore in eeducation, e-research activities, process of e-teaching and its slide rules for better enhancement and improvements. In the proposed system the reuse orientation provides many advantages, but it also requires systematic approach in design, planning, extensive development, support of a more complex maintenance process in eeducation, and in general, more consideration being given to quality such as error density of components. This paper redefines the basic definition of defect removal efficiency in terms of the phases involved in the reuse based development and also gives a systematic approach in the defect removal process. The proposed classic defect removal efficiency calculation has been successfully used to determine the efficiency of the defect removal process at various stages of the quality e-education life cycle. References: [1] Jeliazkova, M & Westerheijden, D.F, Systemic Adaptation to A Changing Environment: Towards a Next Generation of Quality Assurance Models”. Higher Education vol 44, no 3-4, April 2006. [2] Beaver, W. “ Is TQM appropriate for the classroom? College Teaching”, 42, no.3:111114, 1994. [3] Alok Ranjan Sahoo, Sasmita Nayak, Aswini Kumar Mohanty, S.K.Lenka,” DRE -A Quality Metric for Engineering Education”, NAAC Seminar, KEC, pp.1-6, Mar. 2009. [4] Eppnik, Y. & van Raad, P., HG Framework for Quality Assurance, Hanze University of Groningen, March 2005. [5] Malaiya, K.Y., Denton, J., “Module Size Distribution and Defect Density”, IEEE Comput. Soc, Proc. 11th International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering- ISSRE’00, pp. 62-71, 2000.
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[6] Barnes, B. H., Bollinger, T. B., "Making Reuse Cost-Effective," IEEE Software, Vol. 8, Number 1, pp. 642-652, Jan.1991. [7] J. E. Gaffney, Jr., R. D. Cruickshank, “A general economics model of software reuse”, Proceedings of the 14th International conference on Software engineering, Melbourne, Australia, May 11-15, pp.327337, 1992. [8] Fenton, N.E., Ohlsson, N., “Quantitative Analysis of Faults and Failures in a Complex Software System”, IEEE Trans. Softw. Eng., 26(8), pp. 797-814, Aug.2000.
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e-Content Evaluation Framework – An approach and evaluation strategy
e-Content Evaluation Framework approach and evaluation strategy
Vikas Garg C-DAC Hyderabad Mr. Vikas Garg is currently working in C-DAC, Hyderabad. He is actively involved in various eLearning Projects such as Quality Analytics Framework for eLearning environment and e-Content Quality, Standardization of eLearning Framework and e-Content etc.
–
An
Mr. N. Satyanarayana is currently working in Centre for Development of Advanced Computing, Hyderabad. His research interests include Network Management, eLearning, Peer-to-Peer Computing. His work in these areas has been published in national and international conferences. He is actively involved in various eLearning projects such as Collaborative Class Room, Quality Analytics Framework for eLearning and eContent Quality.
Dr. N. Sarat Chandra Babu C-DAC Hyderabad
Vikas Rangi C-DAC Hyderabad Mr. Vikas Rangi is currently working in CDAC, Hyderabad. His research interests include e-Learning, Personalized Learning and Usability. His work in these areas has been published in national conference. He is actively involved in various eLearning projects such as Quality Analytics Framework for eLearning and eContent Quality, CET Automation Tool and eSikshak.
N. Satyanarayana
Dr. Sarat obtained his Ph.D in Computer Aided Electronic Circuit Fault Diagnosis from IIT Delhi. Presently, he is the Director of CDAC, Hyderabad. Prior to this, he worked as Addl. Director at Dept. of Electronics, Govt. of India (presently DIT), R&D Engineer at Indian Telephone Industries, Bangalore and as a Lecturer at Regional Engineering College (presently NIT), Warangal. He has initiated activities at Hyderabad Centre in the area of e-Learning over the last decade in Research, Development and Training. He has involved actively in developing e-Learning frameworks: eSikshak – a multilingual e-Learning framework, development of Quality Assurance Framework for e-Learning environment, content development using SCORM standards, Ubiquitous Learning including mobile learning, personalized learning, collaborative Grid learning etc.
C-DAC Hyderabad
Abstract: ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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e-Content Evaluation Framework – An approach and evaluation strategy
Content quality is the foremost important factor in any knowledge environment. Availability of appropriate content with good quality is one of the key aspects which determine the effectiveness of learning process. Appropriate quality characteristics and cultural and demographic aspects have to be taken into consideration during content creation process. This helps in defining a quality assurance for e-Learning courseware. This article examines the existing approaches, their strengths and weaknesses in addressing e-Content Quality and proposes a framework to evaluate the same. This article also presents an evaluation criterion while presenting eContent quality framework.
I. INTRODUCTION Quality of an online course can be defined as the totality of features and characteristics of a course, a learning process and technologies supporting it so that it satisfies learner's needs. In short, we can say that the quality of online courses is defined by the end-users (learners) [1]. It is important to design course material taking learner styles into account as their preferences vary from each other while pursuing the course. Especially when electronic media is used to deliver course content appropriate content interaction has to be provided through different instructional strategies and navigation mechanisms. Course structure and didactics has been identified as one of the important factors from learner’s perspective towards quality online education [2]. Content design for electronic media includes several aspects. As per the study conducted by Penn State Learning Community Hub [3], experts have identified best choices for using appropriate colors, fonts, image formats etc., on different operating systems after a thorough study of its implication on users. Content accessibility is, designing the content in a way so that, content is accessible to all regardless of their physical
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abilities. Following web accessibility guidelines while developing the e-content would make content accessible to every one. W3C has provided a standard (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2) for accessibility of web content [6]. Since the technology used in online education is totally different from print media standards or best practices defined for appropriate usage of technology has to be given utmost importance. For example, a low vision person can read the text book if the same is provided in braille script whereas the similar provision has to be supported through alternative means when electronic media is used for content design/development. While evaluating quality of the content, some aspects can be evaluated technically while others need manual intervention. Manual intervention will be required especially when the quality is defined in qualitative statements rather then quantitative. This paper proposes that addressing of demographic and cultural effects on the quality of the content is also one important criterion to be taken into consideration. This particular dimension where quality of the content needs to be explored further in the context of respective country. This paper proposes architecture for the evaluation of e-Content. Proposed architecture considers available standards, guidelines and best practices along with suggestions from different stakeholders like learners, subject experts, tutors etc to come out with an action plan for evaluation. This paper focuses on Quality of e-Content by considering the following aspects. A) Instructional Design B) Content Design Principle C) Accessibility of the content D) Evaluation of quality based on the demographic and cultural effects.
II. RELATED WORK Instructional design is one of the most widely accepted quality characteristic of the
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e-Content Evaluation Framework – An approach and evaluation strategy
content. Instructional design of the content is to ensure that all necessary components of successful instruction are present; Explanation, Demonstration, Practice, and Feedback etc. For Instructional design this paper is considering a standard given by Michigan virtual university [4]. This standard defines a unique set of guidelines for each objective of the course. This standard defines criteria to evaluate course quality based on the type and number of performance objectives in a course. The other methodology for evaluating the quality of content is to create objective criteria based on the existing elements that represent pedagogical content [5]. The proposed framework for the pedagogical evaluation of the content takes functional learning styles of students, the media elements and the interactive aspects of learning into consideration. Though the quality parameters chosen here are of highly relevant there is no mention in the article regarding another important characteristic of the content i.e., context of information and necessity of course guidelines. The Chinese E-Learning Technology Standards (CELTS-22) specification describes a framework of quality characteristics of Web-based courses and defines corresponding evaluation criteria [9]. The specification work defines quality characteristics for a Web based course along four dimensions. These are: Content Design, Instructional Design, Interface Design, and Technology Design. The framework is transformed into evaluation criteria by adding a description of the criteria, an expanded description and criteria indicators and a note with samples of the criteria. Unlike in this article our approach projected mandatory items only to be evaluated under each quality characteristic. In Taiwan, an e-Learning Courseware Certification (eLCC) program was implemented by the Quality Center of the e-Learning Network Science Park [10]. The eLCC quality framework consists of 4 aspects of quality measures. These are: Content, Navigation, Instructional Design ELELTECH INDIA 2009
and Instructional Media. Under these 4 quality measures, eLCC is defining 15 quality criteria. Each eLCC quality criterion comprises a 4-level rubric to examine the extent of e-learning courseware from a specific quality perspective and gives the points of 7, 5, 3, or 0 for a required criterion and 6, 4, 2, or 0 for an optional criterion. Though the identified quality characteristics in this article are more or less similar to the approach mentioned in our work, the current proposal tried to elaborate the characteristics in terms of corresponding questionnaires and deviated in evaluation criteria based on statistical analysis.
III. APPROACH AND ARCHITECTURE After considering the standards, best practices and guidelines related to quality of the content, in this paper we are proposing the following Quality Characteristics for evaluating quality of e-Content. • Instructional Design • Content Design Principle • Accessibility of the content • Principles of Demographic Cultural aspects The proposed architecture evaluation of e-content is
for
and
the
In the proposed architecture e-content quality assessment plan would be developed based on various standards/best practices/guidelines related to the above quality characteristics. The framework evaluates quality of the content by taking respective standards into consideration. These standards will be supplemented with course specific quality guidelines. The guidelines will be formed based on survey and interviews with different stakeholders of the field like subject experts, tutors, learners etc. This
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e-Content Evaluation Framework – An approach and evaluation strategy
assessment plan would work like the evaluation criterion for the e-Content quality. The criterion to be followed w.r.t evaluation of each quality characteristic is given below. A. Instructional Design Standard: For Instructional design Quality Characteristic this paper refers the approach of Michigan virtual university [4]. In this approach instructional design category of standards will be dependent upon the type and number of performance objectives in a course and therefore there are not discrete standards that apply to an entire course. Online courses can be broken down into Units and Objectives. All of the instruction that can be mapped to an objective will be of a particular Performance/Knowledge type (PK Types). Depending upon the type of knowledge and performance that is required for each objective, this standard defines a unique set of standards for that objective. Identifies PK Types of the standards are: -
Recall Fact Recall Concept Apply Concept Identify Task Recall Principle Apply Principle Derive Solution
-
Recall Element Identify Concept Recall Task Perform Task Identify Principle Derive Method
Here we are giving explanation of one PK type for example purpose. PK type - Recall Fact:
This standard of the Instructional Design category defines the Instruction needed to effectively teach learners to memorize, recall or identify a Fact. Recall Fact PK type can breakdown into 4 sub-standards. 1.Presence of 2.Presence of 3.Presence of 4.Presence of
further
Appropriate Explanation Appropriate Practice Appropriate Feedback Appropriate Assessment
Standard specifies criteria for each substandard. Ratings range for the standard is from 5 (Excellent) to 1 (Inferior). B. Content Design Principles: This quality characteristic is related to best choice on web content design aspects according to the experts. Content design principles that include, but not limited to the following, have been taken into consideration while evaluating content design aspects. • Avoid specifying a font size for the main text - let the browser handle it. • Use H1, H2, H3 tags for headers and sub headers instead of manually changing font sizes. • Avoid all upper case letters, and use upper and lower case. • Appropriate colors and font size.
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e-Content Evaluation Framework – An approach and evaluation strategy
• Maintain sufficient contrast between text and background colors. C. Accessibility: Accessibility of the content is anther very important aspect of the content. While evaluating accessibility of the content, some aspects of the content can be evaluated automatically while others can not, for those we can use manual evaluation For example in html content to show an image
tag is used and alternative text of the image, can be specify in the alt attribute of img tag. As part of the automatic evaluation, we can evaluate whether the alt attribute is present in the img tag or not however it is hard to automate whether alt text is relevant to the image or not. For this manual evaluation must be used. Some of the aspects related to accessibility of the content are include, but not limited to::
• Table of contents or index is available in the courseware. • Audio is supported in the courseware wherever appropriate. • Video / flash used effectively wherever necessary to explain concepts. • Glossary of terms in the courseware is provided. • Course title represent the content of the manuscript • Course elements match target audience expectations • Purpose of the course is clear • Course content layout is meaningful • Every non text element should be accompanied with equivalent text description. • Organize documents so they may be read by assistive technologies properly. • Check whether each page has meaningful title. D. Demographic and Cultural effects In this section we are trying to relate quality of e-content with demographical and
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cultural aspects. Here we are proposing the guidelines that include, but not limited to: • Use simple language for the content • Narrate concepts and examples by taking case studies based on local conditions wherever possible. • Write content in a commonly used language instead of getting influenced by any particular slang.
IV. EVALUATION CRITERIA As noticed above, most of the guidelines are subjective in nature and require intervention of experts to determine quality of the content especially w.r.t instructional design standards. We would like to evaluate quality of the content by taking variance in the ratings given by the evaluators into consideration while accepting the mean acceptance rate of a particular quality characteristic. If the variance in ratings given by the evaluators is out of the acceptable range then the average acceptance rate measured will not be considered for awarding appropriate quality level to the course content. The acceptable range has to be decided based on the consensus by the e-Learning stakeholders This evaluation criterion can be used to award different quality levels to the eContent accordingly as mentioned below. Average Acceptance Rate > 95% > 70% >= 60% < 60%
Level AAA Level AA Level A Non conforming
V. CONCLUSION: This article has brought out the need of quality assessment framework for eContent quality evaluation. We have proposed an architecture to evaluate the quality of eContent especially with respect to Accessibility, Content design and Instructional design quality characteristics.
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e-Content Evaluation Framework – An approach and evaluation strategy
We also proposed an evaluation criterion to specify level of content quality and have given the implementation procedure to be followed in this effort.
REFERENCES: [1]
Marijana vidak & Sabina saina, Quality in E-learning: Quality of Online Courses. [2] Best Paper @ Third EDEN Research Workshop 2004, Oldenburg, Germany: Ehlers, U.-D. (2004): Quality in ELearning from a Learner’s Perspective. [3] Penn state learning design community hub URL: http://ets.tlt.psu.edu/learningdesig n/ [4] standards for Quality online courses by Michigan Virtual University URL: http://standards.mivu.org/ [5] Jorge Joel Reyes, Ángel Torres and Laurie Harrison, A Framework for the Pedagogical Evaluation of Online Courses: Implications for Web-based Teaching & Learning. [6] Web Content Accessibility Guidelines – Accessibility Standard by W3C URL: http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/ [7] Ming-Puu Chen & Kuo-En Chang, The Analysis of a Courseware Quality Framework for e-Learning. [8] Xia Tenga,b, Brandon MuramatsuaJian Wei Zhangc, Joseph G. Tront, Implementation of Quality Evaluation for Web-based Courses and Digital Learning Resources. [9] Xia Teng, Brandon Muramatsu ,Jian Wei Zhangc, Joseph G. Tront, Implementation of Quality Evaluation for Web-based Courses and Digital Learning Resources [10] Ming-Puu Chen & Kuo-En Chang, The Analysis of a Courseware Quality Framework for e-Learning
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Collaborative Objects in Distance Education (CODE)
Collaborative Objects in Distance Education (CODE) Abstract:
Dr. Kamal Bijlani, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham Prof. Kamal Bijlani is the Head of ELearning Initiatives at Amrita University and has been leading several R&D programs. These include E-Learning Distance Education with ISRO and TIFAC, and a National Multimedia Business Portal for Indian entrepreneurs. Before moving to Amrita, Kamal was CEO of a multimedia and gaming startup company in the USA called Into The Mystery, Inc. Kamal has led consulting projects at Genysm, an Artificial Intelligence company (from MIT.) He was Project Manager of Model-Based Software project at Cimflex Teknowledge ( from Stanford.) An advanced practitioner in real-time software, multimedia, and video, Kamal has hands-on experience in the architecture and development of several systems; published papers, won an award for a video documentary, and led several multimedia productions. He got his BE in Electronics from BITS Pilani (1982) and Masters in Computer Science from Michigan (1984).
During synchronous mode of distance education, there is often a need for sharing information and activities that are somewhat complex. If the bandwidth available on the network is high, the user can share the screen with others. However, during screen sharing, the interaction between the users is limited. If applications are shared in a collaborative way, the various users can observe and interact with each other’s work. However, this requires a distributed control strategy so that the information passed is minimal to reduce usage of bandwidth, users can work independently when needed, and effective initialization can be done for the user applications. We have been designing a system architecture within our distance education paradigm where several collaborative objects are being created and used with multiple users. We will share our experiments and give a demonstration if needed. Recent E-Learning Publications: 1) Kamal Bijlani, P.Venkat Rangan, Manoj P(2008). A Framework for Interactive eLearning in a Virtual World, 11th International Conference on Business Information Systems, BIS 2008; Innsbruck, Austria http://bis.kie.ae.poznan.pl/11th_bis/ 2) Kamal Bijlani, P.Venkat Rangan, (2008). Long Distance Teaching with Social Environment across Multiple Universities, World Conference on E-Learning in Corporate, Government, Healthcare, & Higher Education is an international conference Las Vegas, Nevada http://www.aace.org/conf/ELEARN/ 3) Kamal Bijlani, Chitra S. Pai, Bhavani B., (2009). E-Learning in Social Applications,
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World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia & Telecommunications, Honolulu, USA http://www.aace.org/conf/edmedia/ 4) Nishant Gupta1, Yogeshwara K1., Vinay Kumar R.N. 1, Rakesh Singh Bisht1, Yaswanth Ginnela1, Kumar Rajamani1, Kamal Bijlani2, Krishnashree Achuthan2, Bhavani Bijlani, (HAVE 2009) Virtual Fabric Paint Environment Using Touch and Gesture for Vocational Training
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Open Source Technologies and Open Source Courseware in e-Learning
Open Source Technologies and Open Source Courseware in e-Learning Abstract:
Nirupama Nayana Rout C-DAC Chennai
Prathibha. B C-DAC Chennai
Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) is the new buzz word in today's fast moving world where cost cutting is the primary goal for companies starting from profit making organizations, non profit organizations (NGOs), government firms, schools and colleges. Recession is a growth catalyst for the sales of Learning Technology products and services. Exe (E-learning XHTML editor) is one such boon for the society in present scenario. Developed in New Zealand specifically for academics and teachers, possibly with minimal technical expertise, it is a straightforward way to create and publish web content without having to learn HTML or XML. An unexpected benefit of eXe is that it forces teachers to consider and sequence learning activities, making the learning design more transparent. Diverse activities like on-line learning, clean paste from Word, display equations and images, without needing to use HTML or web authoring tools, linkage to external websites, creation of simple Multiple Choices Questions (MCQs) and quizzes, style sheets (appearances), audio/video support, insertion of flash images, creation of geometrical diagrams, physical sciences diagrams, Chemical equations, flowcharts, insertion of educative movies, etc., are possible through Exe tool.
Index Terms—A* e-Learning, Free Open Source Software, Web content, XHTML
INTRODUCTION E-LEARNING is being presented in the market as the next evolution of training and education industry and the next phase in the digital revolution. In this paper we have tried to draw a thin line between various aspects of ELELTECH INDIA 2009
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e-learning. The following queries could be answered and we can reach to a specific goal after going through this paper. • • • •
How does it differ from age-old technology based training? Is it more effective than existing computer based training? Can we still replace some of the instructor-based classroom training? What kind of e-learning tools and techniques should we be looking at?
With the evolution of many technology terms with “e”, e-learning encompasses many different things. It has been a popular buzz word since last few years. Elliot Masie, a leading e-learning guru in the USA, supports the view that “On-line learning is not about taking a course and putting it on desktop. It is about a new blend of resources, interactivity, performance support and structured learning activities.” Definition “Combination of learning services and technology to provide high value integrated learning: anytime, any place” The evolution of computers and Internet, along with the information Technology and Collaborative study, has made the teachers to be at the verge of anachronism. The importance of learner and knowledge has grown tremendously within few years. A perfect blend is a must where all four could be used effectively and efficiently without any imbalance in the countries economy It is true that there has not been any significant change in the tertiary education sector for centuries. There have been tweaks here and there but, by and large, as a sector it has been slow to change and, indeed, resistant any change. Recently though , there have been indications of a major paradigm shift, explained possibly by the following two factors : first, the changing political and economic landscape that has forced universities to become a conscious stakeholder and be market-oriented; and second, what might be described as the ELELTECH INDIA 2009
‘disruptive technology’ of e-learning [1]. We welcome both the developments because of the vast opportunities they present to people who are currently poorly served, or not served at all by tertiary education. More significantly, we believe that, barring few exceptions, tertiary institutions have little option but to embrace learners and learning, in order to take advantage of these new market openings.
e-LEARNING: FEATURES
basic
FRAMEWORK
AND
The rapid growth of e-Learning is propelled by the Internet and the enormous opportunity embedded in global education. Media attention, public curiosity and the various initiatives by the governments across the globe looking at e-learning as a means to bridge the digital divide, have made eLearning a hot topic. According to estimates from IT consultant, International Data Corporation (IDC), the elearning industry in the Asia Pacific region will double every year in the next one to three years to be worth about USD 462 million. Australia, Korea, China and Singapore are countries that are set to lead the E-learning industry in the Asia Pacific. Corporate training, higher education, and K12 are three sectors within the industry that hold promise for long-run value creation. Corporate e-learning, in particular, is deemed to be the most well defined market so far. India, with its expanding IT infrastructure and established software expertise, is also set for a major boom with particular focus on localization into the various Indian languages. Fig 1 shows the basic framework for eLearning.
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Activity Tracking & Management
Learning delivery models and tools
Activity Tracking & Management
Content
Open Source Technologies and Open Source Courseware in e-Learning Enabling Technologies and Tools
Activity Tracking & Management
Fig 1: eLearning: a basic framework eLearning advantages : The benefits of elearning can be manifold. It is not location specific. Anyone, anywhere with a PC can follow the same training course, without leaving his or her desk. Besides the obvious time and cost savings one could reap by not having to travel, e-learning can provide a more personal training experience as it allows for extreme flexibility in content absorption and collaborative work via e-mail, chat, forums and virtual meetings. Individuals can train in their own time to become more marketable and improve their career prospects, and companies can design customized training courses to extract the best from their employees. eLearning can be deployed in technology mediated training and education programs conducted in diverse environments such as colleges and Universities, non-formal training centres, corporate updation programs and for vocational courses. Learning is not confined to what is achieved through internet or intranet media. Even workshops and training sessions where coursewares are distributed through Cds/DVDs can be considered to constitute e-learning. Various e-Learning models are in vogue and we describe briefly some of the widely prevalent modes. 1) Virtual classroom: The virtual classroom model of e-Learning is the most familiar mode for building e-Learning programs. The objective of virtual classrooms is to extend the structure and services that accompany ELELTECH INDIA 2009
formal education programs from the campus or learning centers to individual learners, wherever they are located. This model is well suited for learners who pursue a distance education degree made up entirely of online lessons, and it can also include campus-based courses, with students from on-campus and off- campus locations. It provides a real-time class session via the Internet, and includes places for posting papers for review and comment, tutorials and assignments. There could be team review before posting the secure PDF file containing multimedia assets, and student groups with shared interest could form study sections using web conferencing tools. 2) Online learning: This model of e-Learning revolves around its dependence on courseware, delivered over the Internet to learners at a variety of locations where the primary interaction between the learner and the course provider occur via networked computer technology. Increasingly, learning management systems are serving as the basis for building online programs where the education experience is entirely meditated through a digital interface. 3) Rapid e-Learning: This is a direct response to e-Learning products that made it hard for non-technical subject matter experts and learners to contribute and make use of multimedia learning content to the knowledge base. Rapid e-Learning uses tools such as Adobe Captivate 2 and Adobe Presenter 6 to reduce the time it takes to produce rich, engaging Flash –based learning content. It allows more non-technical contributors, including subject matter experts (SMEs) and students, to share their SCORM and AICC conformant Adobe Captivate learning objects as a stand-alone Flash movie or as an element of a multimedia portfolio that can be securely shared within an Adobe PDF document. 4) Mobile learning: Mobile learning builds on the availability of ubiquitous networks and portable digital devices, including laptop computers, PDAs, game consoles, MP3 players, and mobile phones, and it takes advantage of place-independent flexibility
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that comes from working away from the desktop. Mobile learning provides the opportunity to connect informal learning experiences that occur naturally throughout the day with formal learning experiences, such as those encountered in the virtual classroom model, using games or in online learning implementations.
FOSS and e-learning What is FOSS? Free and Open Source Software (FOSS), also F/OSS, or FLOSS (free/libre/open source software) gives the user/developer freedom to use, study, adapt and enhance the software capabilities. FOSS has gradually evolved from the disjointed efforts of a few early pioneers to a global movement with a substantial technical and commercial base, successfully catering to both developers and users of software. The FOSS movement has been both the technical backbone as well as the main beneficiary of the exponential growth of the Internet, especially in developing countries. The “Free”, as in freedom, is ensured by offering the full source code to enable adaptation. Of course, it so happens that most of the FOSS products are also freely downloadable. The GNU project (http://www.gnu.org) defines free software as “a matter of the users' freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software.” Particularly, attention is given to four freedoms. They are: • The freedom to run the program, for any purpose (freedom 0). • The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this. • The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor (freedom 2). • The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits
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(freedom 3). Access to the source code is a precondition for this. The open source model encompasses a set of principles and values that ensure the integrity of open source software. Open Source Initiative (http://www.opensource.org), a not-forprofit organization has proposed 10 items that are widely accepted by the open source community. These items are: 1. Free redistribution 2. Source code must be included 3. Derived works – allow modifications 4. Integrity of the author's source code 5. No discrimination against persons or groups 6. No discrimination against fields of endeavor 7. Distribution of license 8. License must not be specific to a product 9. License must not restrict other software 10. License must be technology-neutral E-learning is the delivery of education (all activities relevant to instructing, teaching, and learning) through various electronic media. The electronic medium could be the Internet, intranets, extranets, satellite TV, video/audio tape, and/or CD ROM [2] delineated several benefits of open source software for open learning. They are as follows: • The software evolves more rapidly and organically. • Users’ needs are rapidly met as the OSS [Open Source Software] model harnesses their collective expertise and contribution. • New versions are released very often and rely on the community of users and developers to test it, resulting in superior quality software tested on more platforms, and in more environments than most commercial software. • The development “team” is often largely volunteers, distributed, many in numbers, and diverse. Often, paid members of the development team will manage the project and organize the work of the volunteers.
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• Security is enhanced because the code is exposed to the world. As a philosophy, FOSS is fully in tune with the concept of Learning through sharing of knowledge. Open source model promotes collaboration and sharing of resources. It creates a community of people that work together to achieve common goals. Specifically, in the open learning environment, [2] suggest that open source model promotes freedom to choose, increases user access/control, encourages link to a global community, promotes quality, and enhances innovation in teaching and learning. The e-learning movement toward open source model has been evident in the recent years. There are many open source projects dedicated to elearning. Below is a list of several selected organizations that are involved in helping professors build their e-learning courses: • Claroline (http://www.claroline.net) • .LRN Course Management (http://www.collaboraid.biz/product s/dotlrn) • EduZope (http://www.eduzope.org) • Moodle (http://moodle.org) Pachyderm (http://www.nmc.org/projects/lo/pachyder m.shtml) Sakai (http://www.sakaiproject.org) Spaghetti Learning (http://www.spaghettilearning.com) A Tutor (http://www.atutor.ca) What is Learning Object? IEEE defines a learning object as “any entity, digital or non-digital, which can be used, reused or referenced during technology supported learning.” Wiley defines a learning object as “any digital resource that can be reused to support learning. This definition includes anything that can be delivered across the network on demand, be it large or small.” He further asserts that a balanced granularity gives the learning object increased flexibility for reusability.
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Learning Objects have many benefits. These benefits are reduced costs, personalized learning, interoperability, standardization, and customization E-learning and opensource community Fig 2 shows how various elements get involved into Opensource E-learning Constructivism Elements
E-Learning Model-Learner (Learner-
Open-source model communities
Collaboration Cooperation Exploration Higher order thinking skills Interdisciplinary learning Knowledge construction Controlled learning Mediation Goals and Objectives Mistakes and opportunities Multiple perspectives Multiple Representations Negotiations Previous Experiences Problem-solving Real-world situation Scaffolding Social disclosure Social negotiation Primary source of data
Fig 2: E-learning and opensource community
Exe-E-learning XHTML Editor The eLearning XHTML editor (eXe) is an authoring environment to assist teachers and academics in the design, development and publishing of web-based learning and teaching materials without the need to become proficient in HTML or complicated web-publishing applications. eXe is currently supported by CORE Education, a New Zealand-based not-forprofit educational research and development organisation. eXe grew out of the New Zealand Government Tertiary Education Commission's eCollaboration Fund and was led by the University of Auckland, The Auckland University of Technology, and Tairawhiti Polytechnic. It has also been greatly assisted by a global group of participants and contributors.
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As vast majority of teachers and academics do not have the technical skills to build their own web pages, and must therefore rely on the availability of web developers to generate professional looking online content Exe could be the best solution. The eXe software is an environment for authoring web-based e-learning content and is freely available for Windows XP, Mac OS X, and Linux. It has been downloaded thousands of times and is available in more than two dozen language translations. Advantages for Teachers: 1)eXe aims to provide an intuitive, easy-touse tool that will enable teachers to publish professional looking web pages for learning. 2)eXe is a tool that provides professional web-publishing capabilities that can be easily referenced or imported by learning management systems. 3)eXe has been developed as an offline authoring tool without the requirement for connectivity. 4)eXe's WYSIWYG functionality enables users to see what the content will look like when published online. Exe,since uses Xml can handle any arbitrary data rather than being limited to a predefined tag-set. It is also necessary that content data can be represented independently of the way it is rendered. This is extremely important when we come to consider sharing and reuse of educational content in different contexts and using different systems as well as the potential for transforming content for different playback devices. Recently developed e-learning standards specifications for packaging content in such a way that it can be transported and used in multiple environments (e.g. SCORM, IMS content packaging) use XML for encoding the information to be packaged .
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Most of the learning management systems follow a client-server model where authoring process can be frustratingly slow.There is a clear need for offline authoring capability for use in conjunction with these environments. The domain of technical architectures to support elearning worldwide is rapidly becoming one of the most significant areas for both FLOSS and open-standards software initiatives. The global educational technology has long recognised the potential benefits of interoperable software and digital content in reducing costs to institutions and enhancing quality for learners. Furthermore government agencies in many countries are promoting the benefits of interoperability and FLOSS developments.Even Indian government and many non profit organisations are striving hard to adopt FOSS softwares throughout verious departments for more effency and productivity. Features of Exe: 1)idevice: The iDevice (instructional device) pane consists of a collection of structural elements that describe learning content. Some of these include, objectives, pre-knowledge, case studies, free text. Learning content is compiled by selecting iDevices from the iDevice menu and entering your learning content. A learning resource may consist of as few or as many iDevices as required to deliver the learning content effectively. New iDevices are in development and recommendations for additional iDevices are being sought from the wider learning community. An iDevice editor enabling users to design their own iDevices and templates has been released in an experimental format as work continues on its development. 2)eXe offers the ability for users to customise their published content by selecting from a range of graphical style sheets 3)eXe’s Export facility allows content to be packaged in a variety of ways. Learning resources can be packaged as: • IMS Common Cartridge • IMS Content Package
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• • • • •
SCORM 1.2 self-contained web sites a single web page simple text file collection of iPod Notes
The Common Cartridge, Content Package, and SCORM 1.2 formats allow you to deploy your content into any standards-based learning management system (LMS). The various other activities involve entering activity, providing case studies, providing links from external websites, entering free text, image gallery, image magnifier, java applet, multiple choice, multiselect, quiz, true and flase questions, wiki article. Launching Exe:Linux If you installed one of the standard packages, you should find eXe in your system menu. Alternatively you can start a shell in a terminal window and type exe (all lower case) from the command line. This will launch eXe. Cost effectiveness of the Exe tool The Exe tool comes under GNU General Public License.So the users and developers have full right to modify and distribute the software.
Conclusion The tool is very useful in present world and expecting many more enthusiast joining hands to provide more and more addons into the tool. REFERENCES [1] Hart, S., & Christensen, C. (2002). The great leap: Driving innovation from the base of the pyramid. MIT Sloan Management Review, 44(1), 51–56. [2] Open Source: A Metaphor for E-LearningAlex Koohang Keith Harman University of Wisconsin - Northcentral University Milwaukee, Milwaukee, USA Prescott, Arizona, USA [3] http://www.worldwidelearn.com/elearni ng-industry/white-papers.htm [4] http://www.purpletrain.com/archival/20 020426_01.htm [5] . Williams and Michael Goldberg, The evolution of e-learning-Jeremy B Universitas 21 Global [6] Ellen Wagner, Adobe Systems,White Paper-Delivering on the Promise of eLearning [7] http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/exe/w iki
System requirment of Exe: It is OS dependent application and also web browser dependent.A minimum of 256MB RAM and the space consumed by exe is in few Mbs.Exe works in offline mode. Future work :Exe with Orca Orca is a tool which helps physically challenged people to read the screen, reads the selected items and written data. We are trying to provide an interface for reading the Exe tool using orca in one of the Indian languages. The orca tool reads the Exe window without any issues in US English but still lags in reading the whole content with perfection.
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Self-Learning e-Learning Accessibility Model for the Disabled
Self-Learning e-Learning Accessibility Model for the Disabled Abstract:
Annie Joyce Vullamparthi C-DAC Banglore Ms. Annie Joyce Vullamparthi is associated with Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC), Banglore. Her core areas of work involve Planning, Design and Development of Applications in the area of Web Technologies. Her areas of interest are Database Technologies, Ubiquitous Computing, E-Learning, Semantic Web and Robotics.
Web-Accessibility is one of the most important features that has to be, but could not be addressed so far, especially in the eLearning context. In the current scenario of stringent government laws for supporting physically disabled, this has become a demanding issue which needs to be addressed. This paper outlines the need and an approach of arriving at a wholesome model for implementing an accessible e-Learning application, where in each user can get a personalized learning experience, based on his/her preferences and capabilities. The proposed solution is based on Semantic Web Technologies. Personalized content delivery can be achieved by making the E-Learning content modular and atomic and by further adding meaning or semantics to it utilizing the semantic web capabilities, personalized content delivery could be well handled. Accessibility here is addressed through a Rule Based Content Delivery mechanism based on the disabled users’ profile. The model also captures the minute needs of each individual user based on his usage gestures. These are fed back into a self-learning agent of the semantic inference engine which further automates content delivery. Thus enabling the application to adapt itself to the needs of the differently abled user and thus making the system self-Learning. Index Terms -- e-Learning, Physically Challenged, Semantic Web, WCAG 2.0
INTRODUCTION niversally E-Learning has now become a part Uand parcel of our knowledge dissemination process and is considered to be a modern way of learning. Improving on personalization and other features, using technologies like Artificial Intelligence and Artificial Neural Networking, continuous upgradation is
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Self-Learning e-Learning Accessibility Model for the Disabled
happening on the existing open source eLearning tools like Moodle, Atutor and other e-Learning portals. They have reached a stage of stabilization by implementing the Standards like SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model) and embedding themselves with Quality Assurance Frame works. Now the evolution of e-Learning has surpassed the ordinary stage of e-Learning and is heading rapidly towards calm, technology based learning called Ubiquitous learning. Amongst so many achievements, so far the fruit of e-Learning could be accessed and enjoyed only by 60% of the Global population. Now, it is the right time and need to start including the most neglected part of the society - the physically disabled. According to World Health Organization (WHO) Press Release WHO/68, 3rd December 1999 - Seven to ten percent of the world's population has a disability, which means that there may be more than 500 million people with special needs. In his opening statement Dr LEE (Former Director-General of WHO) noted "The way that a country treats and provides for its disabled citizens is a sure test. It is a far more telling indicator of society's development than GDP (Gross Domestic Product). Given the vast numbers of people with disabilities and the complexity of disability issues, there is an immense necessity to put together a common agenda on disability and to implement it”.
E-Learning for the Disabled E-Learning is perceived as the most comfortable mode of learning for the disabled because it handles the major aspect of learning i.e. Knowledge reachability. But since the issues of Accessibility were not being addressed, it remained an elusive asset for the Physically Disabled. With the availability of current sophisticated web technologies, this is the right time to come out with a framework to integrate and imbibe the accessibility solution into online learning portals. Thus opening up the gateways of knowledge to the set of population that couldn’t be included into, to
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a greater extent of web based Knowledge acquisition till now. EXISTING STANDARDS AND IMPLEMENTATION LIMITATIONS World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has defined Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 which cover a wide range of recommendations for making Web content accessible. Following these guidelines, makes the web content accessible to a wider range of people with disabilities, which range from blindness and low vision, deafness and hearing loss, learning disabilities, cognitive limitations, limited movement, speech disabilities, to photo sensitivity and combinations of these. As per WAI (Web Accessibility Initiative) accessibility guidelines, for any time-based multimedia presentation (e.g. a movie or animation) there has to have a synchronizing equivalent alternative like Captions or Auditory descriptions of the visual track. SCORM (The Shareable Content Object Reference Model) is one more De facto standard for e-Learning content. In the area of e-Learning, the SCORM standard is well accepted. In this model, the e-Learning content is packaged as SCOs (Sharable Content Object) along with a manifest.xml file, which can be accessed by any SCORM compliant LMS (Learning Management System) thus making the content universally shareable. But there arises a basic conflict between these two standards when it comes to addressing Accessibility. SCORM uses Javascript to pass info back and forth. One of the WAI accessibility rules, is that if client side scripting is used (namely Javascript); it must also function effectively without scripting. Because SCORM SCOs’ rely on scripting for rendering, they fail this rule of Accessibility. Secondly, from accessibility perspective, content, presentation, and controls need to be separated. In SCO's the Javascript navigation controls are not separable from the content in which they are embedded, thus limiting accessibility. So, a SCORM compliant e-Learning application in itself is not self sufficient for
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handling accessibility. It has to address the accessibility issues separately, through some more mechanisms like complying with IMS Accessibility profiles. IMS Global Learning Consortium, Inc. is a global consortium of organizations working together to develop specifications for learning technology. They have come up with guidelines for developing Accessible Learning Applications for people with disabilities. They offer principles or guidelines that address accessibility which fall in line with the WAI guidelines. Apart from that they also have 3 more principles defined, specifically for addressing accessibility issues in learning technologies. These are listed as follows : 1. Allow for customization based on user preference 2. Provide equivalent access to auditory and visual content based on user preference. 3. Consider the use of XML
PROPOSED SOLUTION APPROACH When it comes to addressing accessibility issues with e-Learning applications, the most important issue that has to be emphasized and addressed lies in the content presentation aspect of the application. Creation of alternate content is inevitable in addressing this issue. Online Learning ‘CONTENT’ is very much diversified, varying from various types of visual and auditory multimedia to, simple text based content. Thus, there arises a need for devising an efficient mechanism to display a properly chosen e-Learning content to the disabled user. Assistive technologies or tools mostly come into picture at the user end or at the client machine and hence need not be handled into the user agents’ (Fig-7) logic implementation of accessibility. Accessibility in general, can be addressed by following W3C-WEB Accessibility Guidelines while developing the web part of the e-Learning portal itself. Following Accessibility Guidelines through out, can easily be achieved by using a Customized tool or an editor for content generation that embeds all the defined rules of WAI (Web Accessibility Initiative), and WAI-
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ARIA (Web Accessibility Initiative-Accessible Rich Internet Applications Suite) in to the portal’s web pages, so that each content object gets embedded with the rules of Accessibility with out extra burden and effort of explicitly creating the content by implementing the access rules at every stage. This takes care of the basic accessibility issues of Presentation aspects like fonts and Styles pertaining to CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), and other aspects like creating content independent of Scripting Functions and Content that can be accessed and used by assistive technologies like Screen Readers etc. PROPOSED ACCESSIBILITY MODEL Accessibility at the learning content level can be addressed efficiently, by designing a suitable model for handling the Content delivery, display and sequencing. This paper proposes a wholesome model which incorporates the standards defined for Accessibility of Learning Content. The proposed solution is based on semantic web technologies. Accordingly it is proposed that, Information or the content has to be made modular and atomic and by adding meaning or semantics to it personalized content delivery can be achieved. This could be looked as a topic based approach of authoring and publishing the content. On the fly, based on certain defined rules, these modular content objects can be automatically and pragmatically organized and published on to a HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) or Java based user interface like JSP (Java Server Pages). Accessibility can be further enhanced through the support of JAVA ACCESSIBILITY APIs’. This can also be blended with a user selected customized style sheet, so that presentation can be handled as per the needs of individual user. Thus the model addresses accessibility through a Rule Based Content Delivery mechanism based on the Disabled users’ profile. RULE BASED CONTENT DELIVERY AND USER PROFILING Appropriate content extraction can be achieved by consulting a rule based content delivery mechanism, which further consults a
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user Profiling module (Fig.7) which helps in making the final decision based on the user’s capability. A user with a specific disability related need can be profiled in the application database with specific attribute tags attached, to minutely identify each disability. This profile may not only include physical disability but could also address web access limitations, related to old age, language disabilities, limited educational qualifications etc. Personalized content delivery with appropriate and intuitive query capabilities at the agent’s end (Ref.Fig.7) can be achieved using XML (eXtensible Markup Language) publishing and rendering methodologies. Thus Semantic technology based active delivery of information based on personalized profiles creates a dynamic learning environment. TECHNOLOGIES INVOLVED Semantic technologies represent meaning for the web content using ontologies. They provide reasoning through the relationships (Figure.2), rules, logic, and conditions represented in those ontologies. Semantic Web agent in-turn relies on these structured sets of information and inference rules that allow it to understand the relationship between different data resources, to make logical connections and decisions. Ontology allows supporting automatic information processing, because it deals with the representation and retrieval of data. In eLearning, ontology can be used to help the content delivery module (Figure.7), to recognize and differentiate different kinds and behavior of an atomic resource of content object, like type of object, context of the content etc. Thus ontology in e-Learning can be used to express the knowledge base. In this kind of approach, when using Semantic Web technologies, ‘syntax’ is handled by XML, ‘data interchange’ by RDF (Resource Description Framework), and ‘taxonomies’ by RDFS (RDF schema).‘Querying’ by SPARQL (RDF Query Language), ‘ontologies’ by OWL, ‘rules’ can be defined by RIF/SWRL (Semantic Web Rule Language) and ‘character set’ would be UNICODE.
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XML provides Rules and Syntax for Structured Documents. RDF provides semantics. Over that RDF Schema provides a way for those descriptions to be combined into a single vocabulary. Vocabularies further can infer meanings based on contexts. Profiles of individual users, here act as contexts to tailor the lesson content to each individual. Thus adding semantics make the online learning systems know, reason and learn. Many existing technological giants in the market too are now coming up with supportive technologies for the implementation of semantic web applications. They are providing support to inference using a RDFS rulebase, RDFS++, OWLSIF, and OWLPrime rulebases. ‘Jena’ is one of the open source, Java framework that is available for building Semantic Web applications. It provides a programmatic environment for RDF, RDFS, OWL, and SPARQL. It also includes a rule-based inference engine. IMPLEMENTATION EXAMPLE SCENARIOS For addressing accessible e-Learning, instead of providing different types of solutions, for each type of disability, correct solution approach would be to provide a solution that creates, an adaptable eLearning environment, which can adapt itself to the accessibility needs of the user and programmatically deliver Context sensitive Content to the user based on his/her personal profile and preference. This type of approach would prove to be a suitable solution for web accessibility for a wide range of impairments. USER SCENARIO:Using the proposed model, when a web page, containing audio content has to be rendered, to an auditory impaired user, audio content would be replaced by its equivalent visual presentation and with an additional content of Captioned Text. Alternately we will have to render only the captioned content in place of the Audio to a user who is both deaf & blind. Thus, depending on the user profile the system now delivers, screen readable content in the TEXT format + Refreshable Braille version of the
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Presentation for the above user, instead of the captioned Presentation, that was displayed for the auditory impaired user. Each learning object can be tagged with attributes as shown below: 1) A PPT file can contain properties like type-of-object as PPT; User TypeCompatibility Normal, Deaf; User-TypeIncompatible Visually impaired; Alternate-object Audio File. 2) Audio Track can contain properties like type-of-object as Audio; User TypeComputability Normal, Blind; UserType-Incompatible Auditory Impaired; Alternate-object Captioned-PPT The same can be represented using RDF as given below. RDF Example Scenario:In the following example scenario, an eLearning course called CCSP-Computer Course on Software Programming, hosted on an eLearning portal is described which has resources identified by URI (Uniform Resource Identifier) and having authored by an eLearning course author. Each resource has its associated property and its value defined as depicted in Table.1. TABLE I: RESOURCE DESCRIPTION USING PROPERTY VALUE PAIRS. RESOURCE PROPER VALUE TY http://www.an Author Annie Joyce nie.elearning.co m/ccsp/ www.annie.ele http://www.an Home arning.com nie.elearning.co Page m/ccsp/ Graphical Data Model [Referenced from W3C Recommendation 10 February 2004.]: An RDF file should parse down to a list of triples. Each triple has three parts: a subject, an object and a predicate (also called a property) that denotes a relationship. A set of such triples is called an RDF graph. This can be illustrated by a node and directed-arc diagram (Fig 1.) in which each triple is represented as a node-arc-node link (hence the term "graph").
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Predicate Subject
Object
“The assertion of an RDF triple says that some relationship, indicated by the predicate, holds between the things denoted by subject and object of the triple. The assertion of an RDF graph amounts to asserting all the triples in it, so the meaning of an RDF graph is the conjunction (logical AND) of the statements corresponding to all the triples it contains.”-Referenced from W3C Recommendation 10 February 2004. DATA MODEL - THE ORIGINAL RDF/XML DOCUMENT RDF/XML document depicting the above example scenario of an online e-Learning course on Software Programming is represented as given below. 1: 2: 3: 4: 5: Annie's Elearning Portal 6: 7: 8: 9: www.annie.elearning.com 10: 11: 12: 13: Computer Course On Software Programming 14: 15: 16: 17: Annie Joyce
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18: 19: 20: 21: Introduction 22: 23: 24: 25: power point presentation 26: 27: 28: 29: Normal User, hearing impairments 30: 31: 32: 33: Visually Impaired User 34: 35: 36: 37: http://www.annie.elear ning.com/ccsp/topic1/lesson1audio 38: 39: 40: 41: http://www.annie.elearning.com/ccs p/topic1/lesson1-pptcaptioned 42: 43: 44: 45: Introduction 46: 47: 48: 49: Audio 50: 51: 52: 53: Visually Impaired,Normal User 54: 55: 56: 57: Introduction 58: 59: 60: 61: Captioned PPT 62: 63: 64: 65: Hearing Impaired,Normal User 66: 67: 68: TRIPLES OF THE DATA MODEL TABLE II: A 3-TUPLE (TRIPLE) REPRESENTATION OF THE DATA MODEL OF THE ABOVE RDF/XML DOCUMENT Subject Predicate Object http://www.anni http://purl.org/ "Annie's e.elearning.com/ dc/elements/1.1 Elearning /title Portal" http://www.anni http://purl.org/ "www.anni e.elearning.com/ dc/elements/1.1 e.elearning
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http://www.anni e.elearning.com/ ccsp/
/homepage .com" http://purl.org/ "Computer dc/elements/1.1 Course On /course Software Programmi ng" http://purl.org/ "Annie dc/elements/1.1 Joyce" /author http://purl.org/ "Introducti dc/elements/1.1 on" /LessonName
http://www.anni e.elearning.com/ ccsp/topic1/lesso n1-audio http://www.anni http://www.anni e.elearning.com/ e.elearning.com/ ccsp/topic1/lesso ccsp/ n1-audio http://www.anni http://www.anni e.elearning.com/ e.elearning.com/ ccsp/topic1/lesso ccsp/topic1/lesso n1-ppt n1-audio http://www.anni http://purl.org/ "power http://www.anni e.elearning.com/ dc/elements/1.1 point e.elearning.com/ ccsp/topic1/lesso /content-type presentatio ccsp/topic1/lesso n1-ppt n" n1-ppt-captioned http://www.anni http://purl.org/ "Normal http://www.anni e.elearning.com/ dc/elements/1.1 User, e.elearning.com/ ccsp/topic1/lesso /user-typehearing ccsp/topic1/lesso n1-ppt compatable impairment n1-ppt-captioned s" http://www.anni http://www.anni http://purl.org/ "Visually e.elearning.com/ e.elearning.com/ dc/elements/1.1 Impaired ccsp/topic1/lesso ccsp/topic1/lesso /user-typen1-ppt-captioned User" n1-ppt incompatable http://www.anni http://purl.org/ "http://ww e.elearning.com/ dc/elements/1.1 w.annie.el ccsp/topic1/lesso /AlternateConte earning.co RDF GRAPHS n1-ppt nt m/ccsp/to pic1/lesson 1-audio" http://www.anni http://purl.org/ "http://ww e.elearning.com/ dc/elements/1.1 w.annie.el earning.co ccsp/topic1/lesso /additionaln1-ppt content m/ccsp/to pic1/lesson 1-ppt-
captioned" http://purl.org/ "Introducti dc/elements/1.1 on" /lessondescription http://purl.org/ "Audio" dc/elements/1.1 /content-type http://purl.org/ "Visually dc/elements/1.1 Impaired, /user-typeNormal compatable User" http://purl.org/ "Introducti dc/elements/1.1 on" /lessondescription http://purl.org/ "Captioned dc/elements/1.1 PPT" /content-type http://purl.org/ "Hearing dc/elements/1.1 Impaired, /user-typeNormal compatable User"
Fig. 2 : Graphical visualization of the data model-Triple1, Triple2, Triple3
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Fig. 3 : Graphical visualization of the data model-Triple 4, Triple5, Triple 6
http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/lesson-description http://www.annie.el earning.com/ccsp/t opic1/lesson1-ppt http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/content-type
Introduction
Power point presentation
http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/user-type-compatable Normal User, hearing impairments http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/user-type-incompatable
http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/additional-content http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/AlternateContent
Visually Impaired User
http://www.annie.elearning.com/cc sp/topic1/lesson1-audio
http://www.annie.elearning.com/ccsp/t opic1/lesson1-ppt-captioned
Fig. 4: Graphical visualization of the data model-Triples 7, 8, 9,10,11,12
Fig. 5: Graphical visualization of the data model-Triples 13, 14
Fig. 6: Graphical visualization of the data model-Triples 15, 16
ARCHITECTURE The System Architecture briefly describes
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the accessibility model which consists of the following modules: 1) Content Repository: - Consists of the web enabled content which is the physical file
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2)
3)
4)
5)
content of the eLearning course. The repository holds the atomic content objects of different file types which are well defined with attributes and relationships using RDF and stored in the Triple Store. Content Authoring tool: - An authoring tool can be a customized IDE (Integrated Development Environment) of a simple editor that generates topic based lesson plan keeping the pedagogy or mode of instruction in view. This can be used for content generation that embeds all the defined rules of WAI (Web Accessibility Initiative), in to the portal’s web pages. This also takes care of the basic accessibility issues of Presentation aspects like fonts and Styles pertaining to CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). Also takes care of other aspects like creating content independent of Scripting Functions and other device specific dependencies. Authoring tool can further be embedded with features to create the RDF data model for the physical content. User Profile Database: This is the database of the users, which stores the entire profile and preferences information of the users. This is automatically updated by a continuous feed-back loop that monitors and provides the users’ usage gestures to the system continuously and automates the process of user profiling. Automatic Feedback Loop: - A mechanism for automatically capturing the user preferences and capabilities based on his/her gestures. This helps in capturing the minute details like mode of access, using details of assistive gadgets, level of interactivity of the user, speed or slowness of content access and learning. By augmenting these details with the existing user profile, these details act as input to the self learning engine of the system helping it to adapt itself to various minute details of individual’s disabilities. User Agent: - Delivers the personalized content to the learner’s browser through the Learning Management System based on the Personal Profile of the user. Content is delivered intuitively to the
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user via this user agent from the content repository based on the rules defined in the Inference Engine. 6) Triple Store: - RDF Data Sets are managed by an additional, dedicated module called Triple Store. These store and query large RDF models. SPARQL Query Language is used for querying the triple store and returning RDF triples in response to these queries. 7) Rules Description and Inference Engine: Application specific rules can be defined for content access so that the modular content objects can be automatically and pragmatically organized and published on to a user interface. Personalized content delivery can be achieved using the intuitive query capabilities built in to the rule base Query and Inference engine. 8) Self Learning Engine: - Helps in assisting the e-Learning system in adapting itself to individual users, by self learning mode. Users’ usage gestures are captured and fed back from the User agent, through a feed-back loop to the self-learning Engine which continuously learns the details of different disabilities and content delivery modes so that it can adapt itself to each individual learner and serve him the content based on his learning capability. 9) LMS (Learning Management System): - Is the management system through which the e-Learning content is accessed by the user via a web browser. LMS too is implemented and available at the server end which manages multiple users simultaneously at a time. 10) Browser: - This is any web browser that is used by the user at the Client side to access the e-Learning course. The Learning Content is rendered on to the web browser via this Learning Management System. MODEL COMPLIANCE TO DEFINED STANDARDS Apart from complying to WAI access standards this model complies to the set of standards defined by IMS Global Learning Consortium, Inc which is a global consortium
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of organizations working together to develop specifications for learning technology. This proposed model satisfies all the defined guidelines as described in the following table.
visual content based on user preference Consider the use of XML
TABLE-III: MODEL COMPLIANCE WITH STANDARDS IMS Guidelines Model Compliance Allow for RDF, Rule based customization customization achieved based on user using a semantic preference inference engine. Provide Modular Content with equivalent specific alternatives and access to additional equivalents auditory and are made available for
each atomic content object and relationships established and defined using RDF. Complete XML based implementation approach followed using semantic web capabilities of RDF and OWL
Fig. 7: Block level System Architecture
CONCLUSION Instead of providing types of specific solutions, for each type of disability, an adaptable e-Learning model, which can adapt itself to the accessibility needs of the individual user and programmatically deliver Context Sensitive Content, based on his/her personal profile and preference is proposed. Presentation of a Real Time, compiled version of e-Learning content to the disabled user is achieved, based on his/her personal Profile and Preferences. Here search for alternate content and its rendering do not need any elaborate search mechanisms but can happen with a
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simple start from a specified node in the Triple structure. Thus, content access is immediate and seamless. Alternate content can easily be traced and dynamically displayed with minimum time and effort, as all the content nodes are well defined and traced using URIs. This has the added advantage of enhanced performance. User, gesture based feed-back to a self-learning agent of a semantic inference engine automates the learning process of the system and relieves the user of recurrent manual updation of his/her profile and preferences. Key words: e-Learning, Physically Challenged, Semantic Web, WCAG 2.0
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ACKNOWLEDGMENT This paper has had the benefit of constructive criticism by Mr. B.S.Bindhumadhava, Programme Coordinator, C-DAC, Knowledge Park. I would like to thank him for his valuable time and advice. I would like to thank Mr.R.K.Senthil Kumar, Team Coordinator (Real Time Systems Group), C-DAC for the support extended in bringing out this paper.
(Pontevedra), Spain
[email protected]. [10]eLearning and Semantic Web- By G. Santhosh Kumar,Dept. Of Computer Science, Cochin University. [11]Implementing a SPARQL compliant RDF Triple Store using a SQL-ORDBMS, By: Orri Erling (Program Manager, OpenLink Virtuoso).
REFERENCES [1] RDF graphs Generated using online RDF Validation service provided by W3C (http://www.w3.org/RDF/Validator/) [2] Towards an Ontology for Describing Emotions, Juan Miguel López1, Rosa Gil1, Roberto García1, Idoia Cearreta2,and Nestor Garay2 1 GRIHO Research Group, Universitat de Lleida, Lleida, Spain {juanmi,rgil,rgarcia}@diei.udl.cat 2 Laboratory of Human-Computer Interaction for Special Needs, University of the Basque Country, Donostia-San Sebastian, Spain {idoia.cearreta,nestor.garay}@ehu.es [3] The Web Standards Project (WaSP) [4] W3C Semantic Web ActivitySpecifications (Recommendations and Notes) [5] WAI-ARIA Overview from w3c Web Accessibility Initiative. [6] e-Learning: Content Generation Tools An XML-based Semantic Content Object Approach-Amit Bhutoria,IIT Kharagpur and Akshay Mishra, IIT Kharagpur. [7] Keys to Access-Accessibility conformance in VET- By, Reece Lamshed,Dr Marsha Berry,Laurie Armstrong(flexiblelearning.net.au) [8] Cooking up a SCORM,A SCORM 1.2 Content Cookbook for DevelopersVersion 1.2 – Draft 0.8- Claude Ostyn Learning Standards Strategist Click2learn, Inc. [9] Design of a Semantic Web-based Brokerage Architecture for the Elearning Domain.A Proposal for a Suitable Ontology - By Juan M. Santos, Luis Anido and Martín Llamas,University of Vigo, E.T.S.E. de Telecomunicación,E-36310, Vigo
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Course Material Sharing System for Educational Institutes using Open Source and Free Softwares
Course Material Sharing System for Educational Institutes using Open Source and Free Softwares Abstract:
S. Saravanan Pandit Jawaharalal Nehru College Agriculture & Research Institute, Karaikal
of
Mr. S. Saravanan is at present working as Assistant Professor (Computer Science) in Department of Agricultural Economics, Extension and Computer Science in Pandit Jawaharalal Nehru College of Agriculture & Research Institute, Karaikal, U.T. of Puducherry, India. He is a Life member in The Indian Science Congress Association.
Dr. S. Nadaradjan Pandit Jawaharalal Nehru College Agriculture & Research Institute, Karaikal
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Dr. S. Nadaradjan is at present working as Assistant Professor (Crop Physiology) in Department of Plant Breeding & Genetics in Pandit Jawaharalal Nehru College of Agriculture & Research Institute, Karaikal, U.T. of Puducherry, India. He was awarded Junior Research fellowship and Senior Research Fellowship from Indian Agricultural Research Station, New Delhi, to pursue his Masters and Doctoral degree respectively.
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In an educational institute, it is highly essential to share files like softwares, course materials by the staffs to the students without spreading viruses. Each staff will like to upload and maintain the files they like to share with students using their own username and password. Students should be able to access the files which the staff wish to share, but no student should be able to delete or modify the files. This necessitates for the creation of Course Material Sharing System. If files are stored in individual staff's computers around the clock availability, taking of regular backup and taking care of the computer under air conditioned room will be difficult. Simply if an FTP server or file sharing is used to share files, the first problem may be spreading of viruses. Moreover staffs may upload unlimited amount of data and may disturb the working of sharing service. If files are scanned for viruses during both uploading and downloading with the server, it may overload the server that is running the sharing service. Some proprietary softwares are very costly. Open source and free softwares are used for cost saving and security. To overcome these limitations, Pure-FTPd FTP server software is chosen as it can be configured to call an external shell script after a successful upload of file and has many other security features. Linux is used as it has good quota management system for individual user account. Such a system will benefit students and staff of educational institutions. Index Terms—Opensource, PureFTPd, Apache, ClamAV
Ubuntu,
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INTRODUCTION I
N an educational institute, it is highly essential to share files like softwares, course materials by the staffs to the students without spreading viruses. Each staff will like to upload and maintain the files they like to share with students using their own username and password. Students should be able to access the files which the staff wish to share, but no student should be able to delete or modify the files. This necessitates for the creation of course material sharing system described in this paper.
PROBLEM STATEMENT If files are stored in individual staff's computers around the clock availability, taking of regular backup and taking care of the computer under air conditioned room will be difficult. Simply if an FTP server or file sharing is used to share files, the first problem may be spreading of viruses. Moreover staffs may upload unlimited amount of data and may disturb the working of sharing service. If files are scanned for viruses during both uploading and downloading with the server, it may overload the server that is running the sharing service. Some proprietary softwares are very costly.
APPROACH Open source and free softwares like pure-ftpd, webmin, apache, clamav are used for cost saving and security. FTP Server sharing software is selected as its service is accessible by both Linux and Windows based computer clients easily. PureFTPd FTP server software is chosen as it can be configured to call an external shell script after a successful upload of file and has many other security features. ClamAV with Ubuntu Linux can be easily setup to scan files being uploaded for virus using this upload script. Even files with certain extensions like .exe, .bat can be prevented from uploading in the FTP server even without scanning for viruses for security and reducing load in the server. Linux is used as it has good quota management system for individual user account. Apache per user web directories is used to achieve individual staff from being able to upload and
modify files within a folder like public_html inside their FTP account and students able to access it with restriction through website. A. Ubuntu Installation Download latest Ubuntu .iso file from www.ubuntu.com and burn it in a CD using burn image CD writing module. Boot from the CD and install Ubuntu in hard disk. Let us create minimum one ext3 partition for / and one swap partition. Partition may be created separately for /home. Even more partitions may be used as per wish for /boot, etc... B. Package Installation Install webmin .deb package from http://www.webmin.com/ using GDebi package manager. Install pure-ftpd, clamavdaemon, quota, apache2-mpm-worker using synaptic package manager. C. ClamAV Configure clamav-daemon and comment the line “Example” from /etc/clamav/clamd.conf. D. Preparation of “pure-ftpd_standalone” file Use "sudo nautilus" command in terminal whenever files have to be handled as root. Create a file “pure-ftpd_standalone” inside “/etc/init.d/”. Right click the file and select properties, permissions. Set permission as executable, read/write for root, read only for others. Content of the file should be #!/bin/sh case "$1" in 'start') /usr/sbin/pure-ftpd --dontresolve -chrooteveryone --daemonize --syslogfacility none --anonymouscantupload --login unix -uploadscript /usr/sbin/pure-uploadscript -B -r /etc/pureftpd/upload.sh ;; 'stop') kill $(cat /var/run/pure-ftpd.pid) ;; *) echo "Usage: $0 { start | stop }" ;; esac exit 0. E. Preparation of “upload.sh” file Create a file “upload.sh” inside “/etc/pure-ftpd/”. Right click the file and
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select properties, permissions. Set permission as executable, read/write for root, read only for others. Content of the file should be #!/bin/sh fn=$1 dotpos=`expr index "$fn" .` if [ $dotpos = "0" ] then exit fi fnlength=${#fn} i=$fnlength rfn="" for (( i=$fnlength ; i>=0 ; i-- )) do onechar=${fn:i:1} rfn=$rfn$onechar done rdotpos=`expr index "$rfn" .` dotpos=`expr $fnlength - $rdotpos` exten=${fn:dotpos} case "$exten" in .[bB][aA][sStT]) rm "$1" ;; .[eE][xX][eE]) rm "$1" ;; *) /usr/bin/clamdscan --remove --quiet --nosummary "$1"; esac F. Webmin Using System > Administration > Users and Groups set root password manually. To enter webmin use https://127.0.0.1:10000/ . Enter webmin. Select System, Bootup and shutdown. select "No" in "Start at boot time" after clicking pure-ftpd and click save. Select "Yes" in "Start at boot time" after clicking pure-ftpd_standalone and click save. G. Quota Enter Webmin. Select System, Disk and Network Filesystems. If / is where the only ext3 partition is mounted, then click that. Change "User only" in Use Quotas? and click save. Download Disk Quotas module quota.wbm.gz. Select Webmin, Webmin Configuration, Webmin Modules, Install from local file. Then use https://127.0.0.1:10000/quota/ to access quota module. Click at a filesystem, say / .
Users will be listed. Click at a user to set their quota. Quota prevents a particular user from overloading the server with files. H. Apache web server To enable per user directory public_html in apache2, right click the files userdir.conf and userdir.load in /etc/apache2/mods-available/ one by one and select make link. Move the created link into /etc/apache2/modsenabled/ and restart apache. I. Access Now any ftp client like gftp, filezilla, firefox with fireftp and internet explorer can be used to access the ftp server. Any files with extension .exe, .bat, .bas will be deleted automatically even without scanning for viruses. This reduces the load to the sever. The file extensions can be changed in the /etc/pure-ftpd/upload.sh file. Remaining files will be scanned by clamav. If a staff creates a folder “public_html” inside his ftp accounts home folder, it can be accessed by students using the following link http:///~ . A web page is created in Intranet web site with the links to all staffs public_html folder following the above format. Students can download the files, but can't change or delete it from the server.
RESULTS & DISCUSSION A. Feedback from users As checked with 50 staff and 300 students under an Intranet and LAN environment with 50% having computers it works very efficiently. After the course material sharing system has come into function and in use for more than a year, recently a survey was conducted by preparing a small questionaire (Appendix) with the users especially the students. A sample of students (50) were randomly selected and asked about easy to access, virus resistiveness, fast and interface friendliness. (Table I). Regarding accessing easiness 100% of the respondent said it is easy to access notes in this system. Only 10 respondent claimed that there is chance of virus. But when discussed with them, they are not sure about the source of virus. 45
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Course Material Sharing System for Educational Institutes using Open Source and Free Softwares
respondents claimed that file accessing is faster. Everyone except one respondent tell that the interface is user friendly. 68% of students are able to able to get familirised with the system within a week (Fig. 1).
B. Course Material Sharing System compared with Moodle Moodle is a Course Management System (CMS), also known as a Learning Management System (LMS) or a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). It is a Free web application that educators can use to create effective online learning sites. It has a significant user base with 49,256 registered sites with 28,177,443 users in 2,571,855 courses as of February, 2009. In Moodle, students can comment on entries in a database or even to contribute entries themselves, or to work collaboratively in a wiki. Many activity modules such as Forums, Wikis, Databases to build richly collaborative communities of learning around their subject matter is available in Moodle. Moodle can be used to assess learning using assignments or quizzes. Eventhough, in Moodle when a single file as big as 100MB is uploaded, the speed of uploading is not as fast as in Course Material Sharing System. Uploading of a folder containing collection of subfolders and files with complete directory structure is difficult in Moodle, as it has to be zipped before uploading and the zipped file should not exceed the maximum file size limit. File names with spaces are replaced with _ when uploaded to Moodle, which sometimes creates difficulty. In Course Material Sharing System by creating index.html file inside public_html folder, a staff can create his or her own intranet website as per their individual ideas. It helps to learn a lot by just observing the activity of our peers. Even five .ppt files of each size 120 MB can be fastly uploaded in Course Material Sharing System. Folder containing collection of subfolders and files can be easily uploaded and shared. Files with certain extensions can be prevented from uploading. Files can be scanned for viruses before being uploaded. Hence using Course Material Sharing System in addition to Moodle has definite advantages.
CONCLUSION Such a system is very appropriate for educational institutions, where staffs independently wish to share files with students without virus. It can also be used in similar environments like research institutions, using which files can be shared within colleagues. Moreover the softwares used in this course material sharing system cost nothing as everything is freely available through Internet. As most of the softwares used are open source, it gives the benefits of open source also. So this can be recommended for all Government institutes, which will save money a lot.
Fig. 1. Number of students against time to get familiar TABLE I Feedback summary from randomly selected users (n=50) Easy to Virus Fast Friendly access Infection Interface Yes 50 10 45 49 No Nil 40 5 1
APPENDIX Questionnaire for Course Material Sharing System in PAJANCOA & RI, Karaikal 1) Is it easy to access the notes given by the teachers? a) Yes b) No 2) Is there any virus seems to be in files downloaded through Course Material Sharing System? a) Yes b) No 3) Is downloading of files from Course Material Sharing System faster? a) Yes b) No
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4) Is the interface user friendly? a) Yes b) No 5) How long you took to get familiar with the Course Material Sharing System? a) < week b) < month c) > month.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT S. Saravanan and S. Nadaradjan gratefully acknowledge the staff and the students of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru College of Agriculture and Research Institute, Karaikal, U.T. of Puducherry, India for their valuable feedback during the development of Course Material Sharing System. REFERENCES [1] [2] [3] [4]
http://help.ubuntu.com/ http://httpd.apache.org/docs/ http://moodle.org/ http://wiki.clamav.net/Main/WebHome
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New Trends in e-Learning
New Trends in e-Learning
K.R.Srivathsan IIITM, Kerala Prof. K.R. Srivathsan took over as the first Director of the Indian Institute of Information Technology and Management – Kerala (see www.iiitmk.ac.in). since Dec. 2000. He is also Professor and former Head of the Electrical Engineering Department at the Indian Institute of Technology –Kanpur. He has a Bachelor degree from the Regional Engineering College, Durgapur in West Bengal, an M.Tech. from IIT Kanpur and a Ph.D. from Queen’s University, Canada – all in Electrical Engineering. Earlier, as a Faculty of IIT Kanpur, he was instrumental in the development of many laboratories in Electronics, Test and Measurement Systems, Communication Systems and Networking, and advanced Instrumentation. He had been teaching and guiding research in the areas of Electronic Systems, Networking and Network Services, Communication Systems, Advanced Instrumentation Systems, Avionics and Navigation Systems. He was actively involved in conceptualizing and guiding several large projects such as the ERNET, Telematics, Power Distribution Automation, Educational Technology Services, and several others. Prof. Srivathsan has been associated with India's developments in Networking, Internet and IT from early 1980s. He was a founding member and coordinator of ERNET in the 80s and early 90s. During this period, he was closely associated as a leading consultant in the pioneering efforts of setting up LANs and Internet services for many institutions and organizations. He coordinated the efforts of ELELTECH INDIA 2009
the Networks Group that resulted in IIT Kanpur becoming the first Institute in India to have an academic area LAN as early as 1988-89. This was the first multi-segment LAN that could link the heterogeneous computer systems of those days. He has been a leading consultant in the networking of many academic and research institutions across the country. One of his significant work was the planning, installation, configuration and commissioning of a large multi-segment LAN and network services for the CAD/CAM and Computing team of Engineers and Scientists of the LCA Project under the Aeronautical Development Agency in Bangalore during 1990-92. He has been actively involved in the curriculum development of several subjects in IIT Kanpur. As the first Director of IIITM-K, Prof. Srivathsan and his team established the hitech IT infrastructure of the Institute in record time and launched its postgraduate programme in IT by March 2001. Besides emphasis on IT, the programme gives thorough grounding in Information Systems Organization and Management. Under his leadership IIITM-K has been pioneering several developments in the applications of IT in Education, Knowledge Management, Enterprise Applications Integration, Digital Libraries, Distributed Information Systems and Technology Enhanced Learning and Teaching. In 2000-02, he guided a group of young professionals in developing a new technology class of advanced Education Servers and Enterprise Portals that support powerful Knowledge Interaction and elearning environment over the web for groups and individuals in any local or virtual organization. This resulted in the first company Transversal E Networks (P) Ltd. (see www.transversalnet.com) being born out of IIITM-K. These new class of servers are now in use in several premier institutions, R&D organizations and industry across India. Prof. Srivathsan conceptualized and now leading the Kerala Education Grid Project
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A 3-tier review model for e-learning modules
(see www.edugrid.ac.in) that aims to enhance the quality of higher education by linking the universities and institutions of Higher Education in Kerala through seamless subject-specific knowledge and collaboration networks. A significant new project that he gave shape and now leading is the Kissan (Farmer) Information Systems, Services and Networking (see www.kissankerala.net) that provides for strategy-focused knowledge management services in agriculture. Recently, along with the Trivandrum City Police, he guided the implementation of an award winning and advanced Police-Community Interaction Portal (see www.tvmcitypolice.org) that caters to the multi-way interaction and knowledge management services for the city community and the police in security related matters of common concern. These efforts resulted in IIITM-K getting the prestigious status of the Sun Center of Excellence in eLearning – the fifth such center in the world and the first in India. Prof. Srivathsan is a member of the National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) that is funded by the Ministry of Human Resource Development and jointly run by all the IITs and the Indian Institute of Science. He is a Fellow of the Institution of Engineers India and a Fellow of the Institution of Electronic and Telecommunication Engineers.
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RFID Based Context Aware Ubiquitous Learning System
RFID Based Context Aware Ubiquitous Learning System work in these areas has been published in national and International conferences. She is actively involved in projects such as Ubiquitous Learning and Collaborative Learning.
Abstract: M.Kumar C-DAC Hyderabad Mr. M. Kumar received the M.E and B.E degrees in Electronics and Communication Engineering with Systems and Signal Processing Specialization from the University College of Engineering (Autonomous), Osmania University, India in 2005 and 2002 respectively. He is currently working as a Member Technical Staff at the “Ubiquitous Computing Research Resource Centre”, Centre for Development of Advanced Computing(C-DAC), Hyderabad, Department of Information Technology, Govt of India. Between 2006 and 2008 he worked as a Project Engineer under “National RFID Programme” of C-DAC, Noida. His area of interests include Embedded Systems, RFID, J2ME, Mobile and Ubiquitous Computing Systems. He coauthored a paper titled “A pilot project for Postal Parcel Tracking using UHF RFID Tags” at ASCNT-2008, India.
Nava Jyothi K C-DAC Hyderabad Mrs. Nava Jyothi K is currently working in C-DAC, Hyderabad. Her research interests include Grid Computing, High Performance Computing and Ubiquitous Learning. Her
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Electronic learning (e-learning) is used to access the learning content using desktop computers. But the limitation with elearning is its immobility. Mobile learning (m-learning) is an advanced stage of elearning where in the user is equipped with handheld mobile device to access the learning content using various wireless technologies. Though m-learning provides mobility, it is not context sensitive. A new mode of learning mechanism called ubiquitous learning (u-learning) is context aware and also provides anywhere, anytime learning using various mobile devices and sensors. But the real challenge of ubiquitous learning is the delivery of learning content to mobile devices depending upon surrounding context. Context plays an important role in delivering the right content to the right device, right person, in the right place and at the right time. This context can be the person who is using the system, surrounding environment in which the system is being used or the device itself. Though there are various contexual parameters that can be considered, here we deal with the location context in particular. This location information can be gathered using Global Positioning System (GPS), Cellular, Bluetooth or Radio Frequency Identification(RFID) technologies. In this paper, usage of RFID technology for context aware ubiquitous learning is explained using two different models.
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RFID Based Context Aware Ubiquitous Learning System I. INTRODUCTION In recent years, with the advancement of mobile and ubiquitous technologies, invisible microcomputers are embedded in to our surrounding environment. These invisible computers interconnect to our home appliances and mobile devices to provide ubiquitous services to the user. Various applications are developed using ubiquitous technologies and one such application in education field is ubiquitous learning. Ubiquitous learning is an advanced stage of mobile learning, wherein the learner is equipped with handheld mobile device to access learning content anywhere and anytime. Providing the right content to the right person at the right place is a real challenge for any ubiquitous learning application developer. Many researchers have developed many ubiquitous learning models for various applications. One such model is a TANGO system [1], which uses RFID tags for vocabulary learning. Though TANGO system succesfully demonstrates usage of RFID in vocabulary learning, still other learning models can be explored to provide learning services in more innovative ways. Others [2][3] demonstrated how RFID and bluetooth can be used to provide learning services in outdoor environment. Though the technologies like bluetooth and GPS can be used to get contexual information, there are many cons associated with them. GPS can not be used for indoor applications because of poor satellite visibility. On the otherside, bluetooth can be used to get contexual information within a short range, but much information can not be stored using it. Compared to these wireless technologies, usage of RFID can be a feasible solution for providing contextual services to the learner with a reasonable range. Also, information can be rewritten using radio tags which is not possible using bluetooth, there by investment cost can be saved.
II. TECHNOLOGIES A. Radio Frequency Identification ELELTECH INDIA 2009
Radio Frequency Identification Technology (RFID) is one of the short range wireless communication technologies used to capture remote object ID using radio waves. Basically it consists of a RF Interrogator or reader used to interrogate RF transponder or tag within its radio range. Radio transponders are used to store and retrieve the object details embedded inside the memory of the tag. There are various airinterface protocols used to retrieve the object ID from a distant location. Frequency standards like Low Frequency (LF), High Frequency(HF), Ultra High Frequency(UHF), Microwave Frequency [4] are being used for developing various RFID applications. The read range depends on the choosen frequency, orientation of the tag and the reader, working environment and the kind of application being used. Various applications like asset tracking, inventory control, supply chain management etc are using this technology. RFID can also be used to locate a person or get the contextual information using electronic sensors and radio tags embedded inside the surrounding environment. This contextual data can be used to provide various services depending upon the person, location, time and the device being used.
B. Java Platform, Micro Edition Java Platform, Micro Edition or Java ME [5] is a Java platform designed for mobile internet devices and embedded systems. It consists of various profiles and configurations like Mobile Information Device Profile (MIDP) and Connected Limited Device Configuration (CLDC) as part of core architecture. Other optional APIs like JSR82(Bluetooth) [6], JSR-172(XML Parsing) [7] etc can be used to develop mobile client applications. Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) can be used to develop and host server side components like XML files and servlets.
III. PROPOSED MODELS
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RFID Based Context Aware Ubiquitous Learning System This paper proposes two models for using RFID in ubiquous learning 1. RFID based content presentation and 2. RFID based learning services.
according to the surrounding context. Fig 1. RFID Based Content Presentation Architecture
A. RFID based content presentation Major challenge for any ubiquitous learning application is to deliver the learning content based on the surrounding context. This contextual information can be gathered using various technologies like GPS, cellular networks, Bluetooth and RFID. GPS and Cellular technologies can be used in outdoor applications whereas RFID and bluetooth technologies can be used for indoor applications. RFID based content presentation model is shown in Fig 1. Whenever a student comes nearby an object with his RFID enabled mobile device, the client application running on a mobile device captures the object ID and sends it to the application server for processing. At server, relevant content corresponding to object ID is fetched and presented to the learner's mobile device. As RFID enabled mobile phones are not available in the local market, two separate hardwares 1. Bluetooth enabled RFID reader [8] [9] and 2. Bluetooth enabled mobile phone are integrated using J2ME application to carry out this experiment. JSR-82 APIs are used to develop mobile client application. The proposed model can be used in botanical gardens, smart museums or a smart lab to enable the learner to access the learning content
The experimental results for RFID based content presentation are shown in Fig 2, Fig 3, Fig 4, and Fig 5.
Fig 2. RFID enabled learning object
Fig 3. Launch RFID Application
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RFID Based Context Aware Ubiquitous Learning System students in ubiquitous learning environment carry RFID tags around their necks and also a mobile device. Local client application running on a PC scans all radio tags within its vicinity and sends this information to server application for processing. Server application determines the location of the user and appropriate content is composed and sent as an SMS to the user mobile phone.
Fig 4. Send tag data and retrieve content
Fig 6. RFID Based Learning Services
Fig 5. Display learning data on mobile screen B. RFID based learning services The proposed model to provide RFID based learning services as shown in Fig 6 is a combination of client and server side components. It is assumed that all the users who are using this system are registered to the application. Even if they are not registered, users can register to the system through a web page or through a simple SMS. It is assumed that all the
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For example, when a student enters the classroom, his presence is captured using RFID reader located at the entrance. RFID tag ID along with the location information are sent to the server application via WLAN network. At server, user details like name and mobile number corresponding to the tag ID are fetched from the database and contexual information is composed and sent to the user mobile phone as an SMS. Here the contextual information can be assignments, technology news alerts, exam marks, or even notes that is relevant to the user in that surrounding context. Similarly when a student enters library, his presence is captured and the latest journals and books information is composed and sent to his mobile phone as an SMS. Various learning services corresponding to various surrounding environments are shown in Table I.
Location
Services
Classroom Exam Alerts, Assignments Library
Latest
journals,
Marks, News 141
RFID Based Context Aware Ubiquitous Learning System Mitsuhara, Yoneo Yano, Kenji Matsuura, Kazuhide Kanenishi, Yasuo Miyoshi, and Tomiaki Morikawa, Tokushima University,
Letters, Books Laboratory List of experiments to be done for that day Canteen
http://www.slrc.kyushuu.ac.jp/rfid-workshop/ogatapaper.pdf
Information about College Cultural Activities [2]
TableI. RFID Based Learning Services IV. IMPLEMENTATION DETAILS Mobile client application is developed on J2ME platform. Server application is developed using java servlets and SMS data is composed from XML files using SAX parsers which is implemented in J2EE. Servlets are deployed in Apache tomcat 6.0.18 and user data base is designed using MySQL [10]. A separate component is developed for receiving registration details from mobile devices. SMS server is implemented using open source kannel gateway [11] on BOSS(Bharat Operating System Solutions)Linux platform [12]. A prototype of this model is implemented using Bluetooth, J2ME, J2SE and J2EE technologies.
V. CONCLUSION The implementation of RFID based context aware ubiquitous learning system is a classic example of using ubiquitous technologies for learning. Due to the rapid advances in ubiquitous computing technologies like RFID, large scale deployment of sensor network technologies, the learning can be made any where, any time providing the learning services based on learner's preferences and context. ACKNOWLEDGMENT This work is supported by National Ubiquitous Computing Research Program of Department of Information Technology, Government of India. We would like to express our sincere thanks to Dr.Sarat Chandra Babu, Director, C-DAC, Hyderabad for his support and encouragement for carrying out this work. REFERENCES: [1] TANGO: Supporting Vocabulary Learning with RFID tags, by Hiroaki Ogata, Ryo Akamatsu, Hiroyuki ELELTECH INDIA 2009
Jiangtao Yin, Xudong Yang, "RFID-Based Ubiquitous Learning Environment for School Students", wmute, pp.176-178, Fifth IEEE International Conference on Wireless, Mobile, and Ubiquitous Technology in Education (wmute 2008), http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm? id=1398485. [3] Yanhui Zhang, Wu Li, Yingzi Fu, A Mobile Learning System Based on Bluetooth, Third International Conference on Natural Computation (ICNC 2007)IEEE Computer Society, 2007. [4] RFID Handbook, Second Edition, http://rfidhandbook.de/english/index.html, Page-111. [5] Sing Li and Jonathan Knudsen, Beginning J2ME: From Novice to Professional. [6] J2ME Bluetooth APIs, http://java.sun.com/javame/refere nce/apis/jsr082/. [7] J2ME XML APIs, http://java.sun.com/javame/refere nce/apis/jsr172/. [8] Bluetooth enabled Low Frequency RFID Reader, http://www.astermicro.com/ [9] Low Frequency RFID systems, http://www.ti.com/rfid/shtml/lowfrequency-rfid.shtml. [10] MYSQL Database, http://www.mysql.com/. [11] Open Source SMS gateway, http://www.kannel.org/ [12] BOSS Linux Operating System, http://bosslinux.in/.
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Ubiquitous learning using mobile devices- An insight
Ubiquitous Learning using mobile devicesAn insight Abstract
Lakshmi Kalyani C-DAC Noida Ms. Lakshmi Kalyani is presently working as Sr. Lecturer and Project Leader at CDAC, Noida. Her areas of interest are e-learning, m-learning, information security and mobile technology. She has vast experience in eLearning technologies and has published many research papers in the area. She is currently pursuing P.Hd in the area of mobile technology and has done her M.S(Software Systems ) from BITS, Pilani and M.Sc (Electronics) from Banasthali Vidyapith, where she had also worked as Lecturer for three years.
The Information & Communication Technologies are undergoing a rapid continuous growth introducing increased number of advanced educational technologies and learning. From early distance learning to advanced e-Learning, it is now the mLearning or mobile learning, which has become the latest ICT technology in providing effective learning through the AAJ (anytime, anywhere, just for me) paradigm. This paper gives an inset into the proliferation of mobile devices in education, by providing ubiquitous education both online and offline. Though the concept is increasingly becoming popular from the last two years but it has its challenges in broader level implementation and adaptation. This paper discusses the challenges and the various tools & technologies required for the successful usage of mobile devices for imparting education.
Keywords:
e-learning, ICT, m-Learning,
ubiquitous
INTRODUCTION V.K.Sharma C-DAC Noida Mr. V.K.Sharma is working presently as head, Finishing School and as Sr. Project Manager and has 17 years of experience. He has coordinated and is implementing a no. of National /International level projects at CDAC, major being the Govt. Funded R&D /Education projects ISEA and e-Learning projects, the India-Vietnam bi-lateral project “Supporting the Human Resource Development of software industry for Vietnam”, between India & Vietnam .
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The ICT (Information & Communication Technologies) is continuously evolving with innovative technologies being used for imparting education, so as to reach increased number of people and that too at their own convenience. From early distance learning to advanced e- Learning, it is now the mLearning or mobile learning, which has become the latest ICT technology in providing effective learning through the AAJ (anytime, anywhere, just for me) paradigm. The possibilities of ubiquitous Learning and business-knowledge management through technology have become infinite with the advent of newer technologies such as mobile Learning or m-Learning.
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Ubiquitous learning using mobile devices- An insight
The use of mobile devices has encompassed almost all spheres of life currently and the kind of penetration that mobile phones or devices have reached is astounding with no other device coming closer to its revolution. This mobile revolution has penetrated into education too in the form of m-learning, which is a natural extension of e-learning. In a span of over five years and more prominently in the last two years , Mobile learning or m-learning has made an exponential leap from theory explored by academicians to a real contribution to learning.
OVERVIEW of m-LEARNING: M-learning, also known as mobile-learning, simply means learning through the use of mobile devices and is targeted at people who are always on the move. This kind of learning or training can be given through mobile phones, PDA’s and smart phones. It primarily refers to the use of small, portable hand-held devices (personal digital assistants or PDAs, smart phones, laptops) that usually operate in a wireless environment, and have a connection to the Internet. These devices promote the use of ‘anytime, anywhere’ learning, allowing users to transcend the limitations of the traditional presence-based classroom, and to fit learning into their daily lives, whenever they have the time or the inclination M-learning or mobile –learning has the potential of taking learning and knowledge across geographical boundaries and generations due to the fact that it can provide ubiquitous access with ease. WHY m-LEARNING ? M-learning can be used as facilitator for elearning by enabling access of some of the suitable e-learning content through mobile, such as quizzes, short definitions, important announcements, etc. Most mobile devices can prove to be useful in education by being a facilitator of administration, and teaching aids for practitioners, and also for being able to utilize it as a learning support tool for learners.
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Some of the benefits offered by m-learning are: •
• •
• •
It offers interactive learning experience where learners can interact with each other through SMS, messaging services or through chat. Anytime, anywhere access to content Mobile phones, PDAs or tablets holding notes and e-books are lighter and can facilitate the entire mlearning process with ease unlike bags full of files, paper and textbooks, or even laptops. Writing with the stylus pen is more effective than using keyboard and mouse. A range of possibilities arise out of this like sharing assignments and working as a group; learners and practitioners can e-mail, copy and paste text,
As mobile devices can be used anywhere, and anytime, including at offices, home, or when in transit, they provide complete ubiquitous access to learning. The major use of m-learning is while on the move, such as on-job training where the learner is experiencing the real-world situation and the prime purpose of the mobile resource is reference and assessment – in which case materials can be simple and effective. The various activities possible with mlearning could be: • Access documents or document libraries • Access quizzes and self-assessment as question or games • Participate in lessons and tutorials • Receive lectures archived or broadcasted live • Access to video clip or audio libraries • Read asynchronous postings • Exhibit student work • Participate in virtual learning communities on the go
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Ubiquitous learning using mobile devices- An insight
CHALLENGES FOR m-LEARNING: m-Learning has become the heir of eLearning , which provides a new more personalized learning experience , but it has introduced many new research challenges and open issues that need to be addressed. This value addition for e-Learning through mLearning faces lot of technological, developmental and pedagogical challenges such as: TECHNOLOGICAL CHALLENGES: The first challenge for all the participants in mobile learning is technological. The main difference between e- Learning and mLearning is in the technologies used for educational content supply. E-Learning uses mainly desktop personal computers whereas m-Learning uses mobile devices i.e the elearning content now needs to be delivered through mobile devices. These mobile devices are limited by and vary in computing power, memory size, screen size, operational system, software, and wireless communication abilities. DEVELOPMENTAL CHALLENGES: Developers face their main challenges during the development of mobile learning systems. On one hand, they must define what type of mobile system they will be developing – one for on-line and/or for offline. Also the difficulties of preparing , delivering and evaluating relevant learning content in the form of learning objects is invariably a major challenge. PEDAGOGICAL CHALLENGES: The main pedagogical challenge to the developers and users of mobile learning systems is that most of them are computer specialists and have little knowledge about different pedagogical approaches. That is why it is very important that developers and educators work together during the development process of mobile learning systems, so that the system supports a desired pedagogical approach. Another challenge stems from the technological limitations of the mobile ELELTECH INDIA 2009
devices. To decrease the content loading time, systems must have the ability to store the users’ profiles and predict the learning path of each individual student.
TECHNOLOGY FOR m-LEARNING Three components of the technical evolution that will provide ‘critical impetus’ to the development of m-learning strategies are: 1. The ubiquitous availability of high bandwidth communications links (such as wireless and 3G networks) that will enable delivery of any item of learning material, anywhere. 2. The introduction of packet-based networks that provide an always-on environment, and will lead to the same low connection costs experienced in the fixed Internet environment. 3. An available base of low cost, full colour, multimedia mobile phone, PDA and PC devices to deliver and process learning tools and content. The various modes of m-learning are seen as: SMS: Short Message Service allows users to send/receive messages of up to 160 characters between mobile phones (text messaging). MMS: Multimedia Messaging Service serves the same purpose as SMS but allows the inclusion of graphics. WAP: An international protocol that allows users to access the internet via their WAP enabled mobile phones. GPRS: An always on internet connection for mobile devices that provides greater speed of connection (171 kb/s). Bluetooth: A short range wireless connection. This enables PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) to pass messages to and from other mobile devices.
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Ubiquitous learning using mobile devices- An insight
3G and 4G phones: By the end of the decade 4G (4th Generation mobile phones) will provide upto 100 megabits per second transmissions adequate for multimedia. PDAs: Personal Digital Assistants have evolved to mini PCs able to carry out many of the basic functions of a larger PC using the Palm OS or MS Pocket PC operating system. MP3s: Audio file format that efficiently compresses files and enables them to be shared. CAMs: Video cameras now embedded into mobile phone and PDA’s While speed and priority of development of each technological component is difficult to predict, the direction of development is clear. That is of Greater bandwidth, low connection costs and multimedia which will make m-learning a more attractive option.
Enabling mobile Learning through moodle-A case study The m-learning content could be delivered though the moodle Learning Management System, with the use of extension services like MOMO (Mobile Moodle ) service . The same was used at CDAC, Noida to test the provision of m-content delivery through moodle. It involved following steps: I.
Delivery of mobile content: II. The creation and delivery of mobile content to mobile devices is primarily possible through two ways: • Hosted services , through mobile learning systems • Device resident applications i.e stand alone applications which can be downloadable for offline access The mobile learning systems either as a part of Learning management systems or as independent applications include components like: • • • •
•
mobile learning management, which registers and track mobile learning use authoring tools for content capture and conversion for mobile delivery mobile simulation templates mobile learning content management systems that download and manage a repository of mobile content enterprise application integration tools
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Downloading and installing the MOMO extension on our Moodle server which makes the mobile compatible contents available for mobile usage. This system was configured and maintained through the integrated administration interface within Moodle. Installing the MOMO client, a JAVA based application, on students’ mobile phones (or any other JAVA and Internet capable device). Through this client they can access courses wherever they are, which allows completely new scenarios.
At CDAC, Noida we had identified the use of m-learning to the students for providing fact based learning., esp. just ahead of exams for providing drill and practice sessions to the students related to formulas in maths subjects, definitions and important terms in computer science subjects and sample quizzes and tests. This way it could provide support for student’s factual learning just ahead of exams and thus be a true pedagogical need for m-learning. In future, it is proposed to develop and implement in-house mobile learning services to the students of our various degree programs. At the outset, it is proposed to impart the elearning content that we have developed and implemented in e-security to our students for
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Ubiquitous learning using mobile devices- An insight
providing important security terminology, definitions, security tips etc. in the form of mobile content.
Conclusion m-Learning, today , has emerged as a new wave of development , based on the use of mobile devices combined with wireless infrastructure . The goal of this research paper has been to i) highlight the requirements and challenges involved in the adaptation and implementation of mobile learning in the education scenario ii) Highlight the usability of integrating m-learning with elearning. The future prediction according to e-learning experts (Rheingold, 2005a) is that the use of mobile technology as a part of training will, within the next five years, be one of the most recognizable components of e-learning and slowly but gradually m-learning will be used in conjunction with it.
REFERENCES [1] Davide Tosi & Roberto Bisiani, “A platform to support anytime, anywhere, Just for me m-Learning “, IEEE Computer Society, 2007. [2] Jim Attewell , “Mobile technologies and learning: A technology update and mLearning project summary “, Technology enhanced learning research centre , Learning and skills development agency. [3] Mike Sharples,” Report of a workshop by the Kaleidoscope Network of excellence mobile Learning initiative “, University of Nottingham, 2006 [4] Carol Savill Smith & Philip Kent,”The use of palm top Computers for learning “, Learning & Skills Development Agency, U.K
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Moving towards e-Learning for all: Preparedness of India
Moving towards e-Learning Preparedness of India
for
all:
Indian Human Resource base will change the future of India down the years and the process has just begun. The concept of education was changing with the development of technology and India needs to make use of the advanced telecommunication infrastructure for revolutionizing the country’s higher education. Technology is a great instrument of change. - Sam Pitroda, Chairman, National Knowledge Commission Existence of inaccessibility to quality education and its impact on learning is clearly the more pervasive issue for many and rightly so since it affects every aspect of our lives. One change already evident is the further growth of e-learning programs in the corporate, governmental and academic sectors due to its lowered costs, more convenient access, and increased demand. Enhancing one's skills is always beneficial, especially in times when opportunities abound. The limiting factor is less often technology and bandwidth and more often availability of the right content which can be personalized and assured of quality by conforming to standards. Instructional content development can increasingly be done by content experts, faculty, instructional designers, and trainers. Online learning tools and technologies are becoming less frustrating (for authoring, teaching, and learning) and more powerful. As a result, online content is becoming easier to maintain. Community based tools such as discussion forums, social networking and resource sharing are increasingly being used in India to provide formal and informal support that has been missing too long from self-paced instruction. It is expected that the convergence of "traditional" instruction and support with technology-based instruction is moving at a faster phase in our country. Considering recent efforts with respect to network connectivity to all educational institutes through National Knowledge Network there is a need to arrive at action plan to cope up with the needs of future trends in online education environment. As the country is pacing ahead, there is a need to ensure quick and simultaneous delivery of latest knowledge to all levels including undergraduate and postgraduate level college and university students and for academicians all over India thereby making it possible to build a truly ambitious education system with the support of advanced technology areas for the growth of our nation. The topic of panel discussion is “Moving towards e-Learning for all: Preparedness of India”. It is the wish of the organizers of the seminar that the keynote addresses, invited talks and authored papers would become inputs to the panel discussion session of the seminar. The outcome of panel discussion may become the recommendations for action plan at National level.
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