Yi-Chan Deng

EduXs: multilayer educational services platforms

How to use the online social learning communities to improve quality and quantity of interactions in physical social learning communities is an important issue. This work describes the design and implementation of multilayer educational services platforms that enable learners to establish their own online social learning communities and integrate their online social learning communities into a large public social learning portal site--EduCities. Multilayer educational services platforms were designed to integrate various individual online social learning communities, and to map these communities into physical social learning communities. This work proposes and implements an architecture called EduXs, and integrates it with K-12 social learning communities. One year after the EduXs system was released on the Internet, 1,849 schools, 15,772 classes, and 130,908 individuals in Taiwan had registered to use the system to construct their own online social learning communities. Among these registered users, 18.8% of registered schools, and 24.7% of registered classes continue to use the system. Evaluation results indicate that the system is accepted by teachers and students.

A pilot study of computer supported learning by constructing instruction notes and peer expository instruction

Learning by teaching has been extensively studied in education and psychology research. However, there has been relatively less effort in this research avenue in CSCL research. Computer supported learning by teaching, as a genus of CSCL activities, is expected to draw more attention in the future. In this pilot study, we propose a model of computer supported learning by teaching that involves peer tutors in preparing their instruction notes and teaching their peer tutees verbally. Collaborative learning is incorporated in our pedagogical design. As an initial investigation and for future improvement of our design, we conducted two experimental trials in a graduate-level course. This paper discusses the design of this model and reports our findings from the experimental trials.

EduCart: a hardware management system for supporting devices in a classroom learning environment

Today, more and more devices are used in the classroom. In this paper, the author focus on integrating the hardware, and provide teacher and student a hardware management system which will easily establish devices supporting classroom learning environment. A hardware device, named EduCart is invented and implemented on classroom devices. Teachers can easily establish their learning environment with EduCart. EduCart was experimented in Da-Hu elementary school in Taipei for six weeks. It was experimented on two classes, one is grade 2, and the other is grade 4. The teacher who participated in the experiment indicated that the EduCart reduces many tedious works in managing and establishing devices supported classroom learning. According to the authors observation, the students are more interested, and proud of their studying environment when using the EduCart. This project is a working in progress project. Several related subsystems and detailed evaluation are needed in the future.

PuzzleView: enhanced workspace displaying for group interaction with tablet PCs

This paper describes a mechanism and implementation of a workspace displaying tool called PuzzleView for group learning with tablet PCs. The paper raises issues associated with workspace layout of group learning with tablet PCs, including analysis, decomposition, enlarge and represent group common display of group discussions.

Bringing off-campus students to the digital classroom environment: the design and use of MSIE system

Distance education has been around for a while and allows students and professors from different geographic locations to share and learn from each other. This paper proposes a prototype mobile synchronous instruction environment (MSIE) that allows remote clients to connect to an existing digital classroom environment (DCE). We explored different scenarios of using our MSIE and DCE systems and conducted a simple preliminary evaluation in a Masters level course. Some of the challenges and issues faced were discussed. The main contribution of this paper is to provide a gateway for outside sources to connect into the existing DCE classroom.

EduBingo: a bingo-like game for mathematics skill building

Many students find mathematics difficult and do not like studying mathematics. Some researchers suggest that computer games can be highly effective in increasing childrens learning and enjoyment of mathematics. In this paper, we described a bingo-like system for mathematics skill building. The main aim of the game is to increase the level of motivation and engagement of students during skill building. The functions and features of the system are presented in the paper and a preliminary study at an elementary school is also outlined and discussed.

Animal companions as motivators for teammates helping each other learn

This paper describes and discusses the design rationales of a system called My-Pet-Our-Pet that intends to realize an approach to using simulated animal companions to encourage students to help each other learn. A class of students is divided into several teams. Every student keeps her own individual animal companion, called My-Pet. An important component of animal companion is the student model of its master that supports self-reflection in different perspectives. Also, every team has a team animal companion, called Our-Pet, being kept by all the members of the team collaboratively. Our-Pet has a collective student model composed by all the student models of the team members. The design of Our-Pet help set a team goal through participating a competition game among Our-Pets of different teams, support collective reflections among team members, and shed light for the team how to help each other. We are currently conducting an experimental trail of the system in an elementary school where every student in the class has a Tablet PC.

EduBingo: a bingo-like system for skill building

Games have been used as a medium for teaching and delivering course content to students. Drill and practice software can help children develop competence in skills such as counting and sorting. In this paper, we described a bingo-like system for arithmetic and English vocabulary skill building. The functions and features of the system are presented in the paper and one example scenarios is also outlined and discussed.