Lluvia Morales

Automatic generation of temporal planning domains for e-learning problems

AI Planning & Scheduling techniques are being widely used to adapt learning paths to the special features and needs of students both in distance learning and lifelong learning environments. However, instructors strongly rely on Planning & Scheduling experts to encode and review the domains for the planner/scheduler to work. This paper presents an approach to automatically extract a fully operational HTN planning domain and problem from a learning objects repository without requiring the intervention of any planning expert, and thus enabling an easier adoption of this technology in practice. The results of a real experiment with a small group of students within an e-Learning private company in Spain are also shown.

On the automatic compilation of e-learning models to planning

This paper presents a general approach to automatically compile e-learning models to planning, allowing us to easily generate plans, in the form of learning designs, by using existing domainindependent planners. The idea is to compile, first, a course defined in a standard e-learning language into a planning domain, and, second, a file containing students learning information into a planning problem. We provide a common compilation and extend it to three particular approaches that cover a full spectrum of planning paradigms, which increases the possibilities of using current planners: (i) hierarchical, (ii) including PDDL (Planning Domain Definition Language) actions with conditional effects and (iii) including PDDL durative actions. The learning designs are automatically generated from the plans and can be uploaded, and subsequently executed, by learning management platforms. We also provide an extensive analysis of the e-learning metadata specification required for planning, and the pros and cons on the knowledge engineering procedures used in each of the three compilations. Finally, we include some qualitative and quantitative experimentation of the compilations in several domain-independent planners to measure its scalability and applicability.

Towards the Use of XPDL as Planning and Scheduling Modeling Tool: The Workflow Patterns Approach

This paper presents a transformation from a business process model diagram stored in XPDL format, into a hierarchical extension of the PDDL planning language, using the concept of workflow patterns as base of the translation process. The proposed architecture is evaluated within a specific teamwork project management scenario: the allocation of human resources and web services for the cooperative development of on-line courses in an e-learning center.

Automatic Generation of User Adapted Learning Designs: An AI-Planning Proposal

A Learning Design(LD) definition under the IMS-LD standard is a complex task for the instructor because it requires a lot of time, effort and previous knowledge of the students group over which will be defined the knowledge objectives. That is why, taking advantage from diffusion of learning objects(LO) labeling using IMS-MD standard, we have proposed to realize a knowledge engineering process, represented as an algorithm, over LO labels and user profiles to automaticaly define a domain that will be used by an intelligent planner to build a LD. This LD will be finally implemented in the ILIAS Learning Management System(LMS).

Planning and execution in a personalised E-learning setting

The main aim of e-learning is to provide a learning route where activities are tailored to individual necessities. But this is not always enough, as this route needs to be executed in a real learning management system where some discrepancies (between the real and expected situation) may appear. In this paper we focus on the generation of these routes from a planning perspective, but also on the monitoring and execution of the routes and, in case of significant discrepancies, provide a planning approach for adapting the route --rather than generating a new one from scratch. We demonstrate that this approach is very valuable to maximise the stability of the learning process, and also for the performance and quality of the learning routes.

Knowledge Engineering and Planning for the Automated Synthesis of Customized Learning Designs

This paper describes an approach to automatically obtain an HTN planning domain from a well structured learning objects repository and also to apply an HTN planner to obtain IMS Learning Designs adapted to the features and needs of every student.

Planning for Conditional Learning Routes

This paper builds on a previous work in which an HTN planner is used to obtain learning routes expressed in the standard language IMS-LD and its main contribution is the extension of a knowledge engineering process that allows us to obtain conditional learning routes able to adapt to run time events, such as intermediate course evaluations, what is known as the standard IMS-LD level B.

Workflow Planning for E-Learning Center Management

Workflow technology was developed in order to help to understand, coordinate and orchestrate the processes that make an organisation work. It is perfectly suitable for the management of an e-learning center, where a course manager have to allocate the execution of a set of tasks among the existing human resources. This paper presents how to make the most of an e-learning business model stored in XPDL, converting it into a planning representation, using the HTN paradigm. The subsequent goal is to obtain an action plan that distribute the tasks needed for the creation and configuration of an online course to a set of workers.

Toward Supporting Constructivist Instruction through CSCL Activities Embedded in LMSs

Integrating CSCL activities is something that has been widely discussed in the CSCL community but as yet only implemented in a reduced set of domain specific tools. In this paper we propose the integration of a set of default and authoring CSCL tools into a standard LMS, as a complete sequence of learning activities based on a constructivist approach. An experiment was also carried out in order to verify the usability and extent of the collaborative work in a real context. Based on results of evaluation, we conclude that the integration of chat was a useful addition to the concept map building tool. This highlighted the professor role as a moderator entity maintaining a central role during the learning experience. The tests were carried out in presence of professors who felt that software would be useful to promote the participation of students and facilitate continuous assessment for this courses and other courses.

Developing Mixed Initiative Educational Web Interfaces for English Education: A Contextual Approach

This paper presents early work tackling the problem of developing Mixed Initiative Educational Web Interfaces for English language learning courses that require the adaptation of their contents to different student profiles. The problem is partially solved through a user centered methodology, with our paper focusing on the results of a visual-contextual ethnographic analysis which helped us to identify the user requirements and improve the interactivity, usability and appearance of the interfaces toward developing a true Mixed Initiative system.