AILE Lecture 3: Tools and Methods

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AILE Lecture 3Tools and Methods
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How Do We Teach? Teaching Strategies

• drill and practice repetition until acquired
• e.g. learning times tables
• expository teaching presentation on material in
  non-interactive way
• e.g. lectures
• mastery/apprenticeship support learner in doing
  skill, gradually withdraw support
• e.g. traditional apprenticeship in engineering
• learning by examples show lots of examples for
  the learner to generalise from
• e.g. demonstrate maths problems
• guided coaching give feedback as learner
  performs task
• e.g. typical in sport
• learning by doing learn through do the task
• e.g. play with simulation and explore it

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e.g. Car Driving (operating complex machinery)

• drill and practice e.g. changing gear
• expository teaching
• e.g. lecture on rules of the road
• mastery/apprenticeship
• e.g. dual control, gradually switch control over
  to learner
• learning by examples
• e.g. demonstrate signal manoeuvre, copy and
  generalise
• guided coaching
• e.g. provide running commentary while driving
• learning by doing
• e.g. actual driving practice - start simple
• What knowledge of the domain or task, and
  student, would need to be represented? How?

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e.g. Language Learning

• drill and practice
• e.g. vocabulary, verb forms
• expository teaching
• e.g. lecture on how verbs used
• mastery/apprenticeship
• e.g. example scene based dialogue, student
  gradually takes over more control of interaction
• learning by example
• e.g. give many example situations, copy and
  generalise
• guided coaching
• e.g. conversation and explicit/implicit feedback
• learning by doing
• e.g. speak the language, communicative approach
• What knowledge of the domain or task, and
  student, would need to be represented? How?

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Distinctions

• DIDACTIC V DISCOVERY LEARNING
• focus on system goals focus on learner goals
• OPPORTUNISTIC V DELIBERATED TEACHING
• exploits situation agenda of material
• DIAGNOSTIC V EFFECTIVE TEACHING
• goal is to ASSESS goal is to CHANGE
• current knowledge or knowledge or skill of
  student
• skill of student
• EXPOSITORY V PROCEDURAL TUTORS
• factual knowledge, skills and procedures,
• inferential skills examples and exercises

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What Is An AILE?

• Tutoring and training systems which mimic tasks
  traditionally done by teachers
• A fairly broad definition, to include
• Intelligent Learning Environments,
• Intelligent Tutoring System
• Adaptive Learning Environments,
• Intelligent Computer Assisted Instruction,
• and other intelligent interactive
  teaching/learning tools...
• Blur distinction between tutoring and training
• use the terms tutoring, teaching,
  education
• and training interchangably....

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Distinguishing Features

• 1. Can react intelligently to changing events in
  the tutorial session, that is, it is adaptive
• Has sufficiently explicit representations of its
  own knowledge that it can decide FOR ITSELF how
  to react.
• Might be expected to do a number of things, such
  as
• answer students questions
• adapt explanation to knowledge of learner
• choose appropriate problems
• adapt to learner's learning style
• maintain focus and direction in tutorial...
• Any one system may not do all of these things -
  but most will do a significant number of them.

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Hartleys (1973) Framework

• 1.Representation of the knowledge of skill that
  is to be taught Domain Knowledge
• eg the ability to solve problems in the domain,
  to judge/comment on student's answer, or answer
  questions posed by the student.
• 2. Teaching actions Teaching Strategies and
  Tactics
• eg making positive/negative comments, providing
  examples, setting problems, asking the student to
  explain, find counter-examples, step through
  examples
• 3. Model of the student's current state Student
  Model
• ie history, capabilities, knowledge, beliefs,
  goals and motivation
• 4. Interface and Communication
• eg discourse between student and system, choice
  of interface - WIMP, graphics, text, speech, VR

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Hartley's Framework Provisos..

• does not imply decomposition into modules, but
  that these should all be reflected in system
• we do not assume a teacher-directed view i.e.
  it can be mixed initiative
• student model should change over time as student
  learns
• mislearning should also be modelled
• We will use this traditional 4 part framework to
  structure the course, but we will not stick
  rigidly to it - often we cannot cleanly separate
  them.

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We should always ask

• Who is being taught?
• What to teach?
• When and How to teach it?

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Categorisation of Systems

• Relates to Engineering v. Cognitive Science
• Aim to create systems which achieve intelligent
  behaviour by any means
• (i.e. fruitful educational interaction)
• often large scale training systems for
  industry
• Systems which achieve intelligence in manner
  modelled on human information processors
• (i.e. educational interaction based on cognitive
  models of users)
• often small scale tutors for schools and
  research
• Systems as means of testing educational theory.
• primarily for research and to inform a. and b.

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Current Educational Tools

• It is increasingly important for us to
  incorporate in our educational tools
• the capacity for dialogue
• to personalise them to the user.
• to consider where and how to include social
  skills in our pedagogical tools and agents

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Representation Issues (McCalla, 1987)

• Multiple sources of knowledge to represent - some
  may be incomplete
• Represent misconceptions and inconsistencies
• Handle inconsistency in students knowledge and
  reasoning
• Deal with change in student teachers knowledge
• How to recognise students behaviour, goals,
  motivation, and integrate it with that of teacher
• How to deal with various strategies for
  consolidating, understanding and reasoning
• How to choose between various teaching strategies

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What knowledge needs to be represented?

• Choose either
• Car Driving (operating complex machinery) or
• Language Learning
• What knowledge of the domain or task would need
  to be represented?
• What knowledge of the student would need to be
  represented?
• How? What representations could be used?