Danilo L. Dalmon

Work in progress — A framework for building Interactive Learning Modules

The development of good quality educational software is expensive, time-consuming and faces some underlying issues. In order to deal with such issues, many attempts were made, mainly on code reuse. Following a similar approach, the development of an application framework for implementing a family of interactivity-intense educational software called Interactive Learning Modules — iLM is presented. The framework main goal is to reduce development efforts while being part of a Software Product Line — SPL, an innovative technique regarding interactivity-intense educational software. The framework specification is presented by analyzing the common features of existing iLM. Therefore, the resulting component architecture is outlined. Currently, the design phase is finished and the implementation ongoing. Also, its instantiation is planned for an existing iLM, as a proof of concept.

Work in progress: A generic model for interactivity-intense intelligent tutor authoring tools

Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS) provide many features that improve learning and teaching experiences. ITS are usually interactivity-intense and content-specific. Interactivity-intense assignments are recommended for scaffolding learning, while content-specific systems can offer low flexibility regarding its possible pedagogical approaches and its uses by teachers. In order to overcome this limited flexibility, there are systems which let content-specific interactivity aside to provide authoring tools, with which teachers can author intelligent tutored assignments without programming. The generic model proposed herein intends to address this problem providing flexible authoring tools for interactivity-intense assignments with tutoring features, letting teachers benefit from the flexibility of content authoring tools as well as the interactivity usually restricted to content-specific ITS. We introduce an application framework which implements this model, which is available as free software.

Accessible educational digital book on tablets for people with visual impairment

Tablet adoption is massive and increasing. Many applications are leveraging this marked widespread, including digital interactive books. A proposal for an educational and accessible digital book reader in mobile devices is presented, focusing on people with visual impairment. An implementation was developed, aiming to complement digital accessible books for education. The work presents a digital book with support for knowledge assessing, text reading, worksheets, drawing and tactile images and maps.

Work in progress — Enhancing Interactive Geometry Systems with intelligent tutoring features

There are different approaches that drive the development and use of educational software, such as Interactive Geometry Systems — IGS and Intelligent Tutoring Systems — ITS. Considering their benefits to teachers and students, these systems may be used to complement each other. The ongoing development of ITS features in an existing IGS called iGeom is presented. First, the limitations of both approaches are listed, describing possible benefits of using them together. Then, the resulting component architecture of the conducted analysis and software design is outlined. The ITS paradigm chosen was Example-tracing Tutors. The current state of research is the tutoring features implementation and planning for testing in classrooms and in distance learning courses.

iGeom: towards an interactive geometry software with intelligent guidance capabilities

Two of the most important characteristics to support learning of geometric concepts are (a) the possibility of allowing students to interact with geometric objects and (b) the capability of guiding these students during the process of interaction by helping them to discover interesting properties and to make “plausible” conjectures Available interactive/dynamic geometry software allow for rich interaction between geometric objects and users, but with no computational support for guiding students This work presents an on-going effort to design an interactive geometry software, referred to iGeom, that have both interactive geometric objects that students can fully manipulate and the capability of helping students by providing personalized guidance and feedback when needed iGeom have been developed in Java, freely available on internet (http://www.matematica.br/igeom), and can be easily incorporated into other programs such as learning managements systems or ITSs To provide guidance capabilities we have been using CTAT (http://ctat.pact.cs.cmu.edu/), an authoring tool that facilitates fast development of cognitive tutors.

Sistemas de Geometria Interativa e Tutores Inteligentes: desafios e perspectivas de uma abordagem conjunta

Este artigo discute a colaboracao entre estudantes na internet e a troca de conhecimento por meio desse canal de comunicacao. Propoe uma metodologia que visa potencializar as relacoes entre os usuarios de uma rede educacional situada num contexto especifico. Tal metodo tem como fundamento as teorias do contexto e a analise de redes sociais (ARS), para promover um mapeamento das redes estudadas.Refletir sobre curriculo escolar formal e comunidades de aprendizagem como metafora das TIC dinamizam os caminhos empiricos, construcoes criticas e aprofundamento da difusao do conhecimento como parte do processo de humanizacao/ tecnologizacao do homem. Oriundos de processos e movimentos contemporâneos, a consolidacao de ambientes computacionais nas escolas potencializa a construcao do conhecimento e a socializacao de praticas pedagogicas inovadoras. Esta investigacao assume as situacoes especificas curriculares, procura descobrir o que existe de mais essencial e caracteristico, partindo do conhecimento de curriculo e suas bases teoricas tradicionais, para a construcao da discussao sobre um curriculo em rede associada a instrumentalizacao das comunidades de aprendizagem.O sistema Moodle constitui-se atualmente numa das mais importantes ferramentas de apoio a cursos na Web. Apesar disto, seu modelo apresenta algumas deficiencias para uma estruturacao hierarquica e compartilhamento de materiais digitais entre disciplinas e turmas do seu ambiente virtual. Este artigo apresenta um estudo sobre a arquitetura central do Moodle, propondo a definicao de um novo nucleo, visando o aprimoramento destas caracteristicas.Estudo descritivo, qualitativo, com estudantes da 3a serie de Graduacao em Enfermagem de uma Universidade Publica de Sao Paulo, SP. Os participantes construiram Mapas Conceituais, por meio do software Cmap Tools®. Os dados foram coletados em um Grupo Focal e todos os sujeitos indicaram que o uso do software facilita e garante a organizacao, visualizacao e correlacao dos dados, porem houve dificuldades iniciais relacionadas ao manejo das ferramentas. Conclui-se, que o software Cmap Tools® favoreceu a construcao dos MC por seus recursos de formatacao, porem estrategias de orientacao deveriam ser implantadas. Como resultado, desenvolveu-se um manual para o uso do software Cmap Tool® em video Podcasting.Ha poucas iniciativas com respeito aos ambientes de virtuais para a divulgacao de materiais curriculares sobre modelagem matematica. Esses ambientes oferecem acesso as praticas pedagogicas em modelagem. Este trabalho apresenta um sistema Web para hospedar atividades de modelagem e materiais multimidia para descrever o desenvolvimento do ambiente de modelagem em sala de aula e apoiar outros professores na implementacao em suas praticas pedagogicas.A composicao e sequenciamento de Objetos de Aprendizagem sao discutidas neste trabalho a partir da representacao da estrutura conceitual de um dominio em termos das suas relacoes de dependencia. A composicao de Objetos de Aprendizagem e modelada a partir da estrutura narrativa de um discurso considerando-se os aspetos formais dos planos do conteudo e de expressao. O aspecto formal do conteudo da composicao e dado pelas pelos conceitos e seus relacionamentos e forma da expressao corresponde aos tipos de signos definidos pelo LOM. A estrutura da composicao obtida independe do tipo de midia utilizado e o modelo adequa-se as propostas de composicao adaptativas tanto do ponto de vista do meio como das disponibilidades de conexao.