Foundations of Adaptive Hypermedia

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• Foundations of Adaptive Hypermedia
• Heiko Spallek, DMD, PhD
• Center for Dental Informatics
• University of Pittsburgh, School of Dental
  Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA
• March 30, 2005
• Dental Informatics Seminar (2202)

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• Agenda
• Background
• e-learning hype
• reality check
• current status of dental online courses
• Adaptive Hypermedia
• definitions, concepts
• usage in education, information retrieval, kiosk
  help systems
• Conceptual architecture
• Technical implementation
• In-class assignment
• Evaluation
• Conclusions

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• Hype About E-learning
• General
• number of online courses 50,000 ? 100,000
  between 1998 and 1999
• online learning market 2.2 billion in 2001,
  estimated 11.4 billion by 2003
• e-learning conference in Europe attracted 10,000
  attendees last year
• Dentistry
• 1998 158 online continuing dental education
  (CDE) courses from 32 providers
• 2001 just DentalxChange.com 428 courses in 27
  different categories
• International Data Corp.

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• Reality check
• E-learning is the revenge of the nerds.
• evaluation of 158 online continuing dental
  education
• uncovered major deficiencies in existing
  Web-based CDE courses
• no author indicated
• relation between course length and credit hours
  varies
• market for course shells immature
• no standards ? risk of losing content
• no peer-review process for online learning
  resources ? no academic credit
• usually no formative or summative evaluation
• high drop-out rate (based on meta analysis of
  multiple studies)
• in dentistry/medicine no one has reported
  profits yet (break even for online course
  300-500 participants)
• Schleyer T, Pham T. Online continuing dental
  education. Journal of the American Dental
  Association 1999130(June)848-854,877-878

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• Evaluation of Web-based CDE courses
• evaluate the outcomes of online CDE courses at
  six organizations analysis
• focused on
• how the participants of online CDE can be
  characterized
• whether the participants' expectations were met
  by the courses
• how the participants evaluate the content of the
  courses
• why they enrolled
• how they experienced the online environment
• ? develop recommendations for the design of
  future courses

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• Results regarding online environment
• Single most important reason that attracted them
  to an online course
• 47 answered "convenience"
• Biggest disadvantage to the online format?
• "lack of human interaction" -- 13 of respondents
• "cannot ask questions" -- 12 of respondents
• Lack of face-to-face contact with a teacher
  stumbling block for their learning
• 18 agreed
• 65 disagreed
• 17 neither agreed nor disagreed

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• Current state-of-the-art dental online course
• collection of static Web pages
• translations of existing lecture notes
• existing course manuals
• existing papers
• first generation online course model
• Course material is still implicitly oriented for
  a traditional on-campus audience!

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• Generations of online courses
• 1. Generation
• static pages
• 2. Generation
• adapted by the instructor to different audiences
  (static versions of the same course saved at
  different locations)
• 3. Generation
• adaptive to the individual learner

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• Adaptive Hypermedia (AH)
• new direction of research
• crossroads of hypermedia and user modeling
• model of the goals, preferences, knowledge of
  each individual user
• use of model throughout interaction with user
• adapt to the needs of user
• Brusilovsky 1996, Brusilovsky 2001

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• Definition User Model
• - mental state of the user
• AH system keeps a model of the user
• to adapt teaching sequence, presentation
• for each Knowledge Item (KI)
• individual user model
• stores some value
• estimation of the users knowledge level of this
  concept
• De Bra and Calvi 1998
• Brusilovsky 1996

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• AH ? Areas of Application
• educational hypermedia
• online information systems
• online help systems
• information retrieval hypermedia
• institutional hypermedia
• systems for managing personalized views in
  information spaces
• Brusilovsky, P. (2001) Adaptive hypermedia. User
  Modeling and User Adapted Interaction, Ten Year
  Anniversary Issue (Alfred Kobsa, ed.) 11 (1/2),
  87-110

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Taxonomy of AH Technologies
Adaptive presentation

• Adaptive
• hypermedia
• technologies

Adaptive navigation support
The updated taxonomy of adaptive hypermedia
technologies Brusilovsky, P. (2001) Adaptive
hypermedia. User Modeling and User Adapted
Interaction, Ten Year Anniversary Issue (Alfred
Kobsa, ed.) 11 (1/2), 87-110
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• Curriculum Sequencing
• active
• implies a learning goal
• best individual path to achieve the goal
• passive
• reactive technology
• offers the user a subset of available learning
  material ? fill the gap in student's knowledge

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• AH Technologies in Web-based Education
• adaptive navigation support technology
• - changing the appearance of visible links
• generalization of curriculum sequencing
  technology in a hypermedia context
• - direct guidance, adaptive link annotation,
  adaptive link hiding
• adaptive presentation technology
• - adapt the content of a Web page to the user's
  goals, knowledge and other information stored in
  the user model
• - pages are adaptively generated or assembled
  from pieces for each user

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• Conceptual architecture
• What features of the learner can be used as a
  source of the adaptation?
• What can be adapted in a technical feasible
  manner?

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• 1. What features of the learner can be used as a
  source of the adaptation?
• users knowledge- pre-test results- completion
  of quizzes throughout the course
• users interests/goals- selection of a specific
  learning goal
• users traits- learning style

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• 2. What can be adapted in a technical feasible
  manner?
• users learning goal ? compilation of KIs
• ? individual curriculum (active sequencing)
• systems estimation of the learners knowledge
  level of each KI stored
• modifies content (adaptive presentation)

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• Adaptiveness
• adaptive text presentation
• inserting/removing of fragments
• altering fragments
• stretch text
• adaptive navigation support
• adaptive links hiding
• adaptive link annotation
• sitemap adaptation
• admission to final quiz only after mastering of
  all offered KIs
• forced repetition of KI
• example-based learning versus concept-based
  learning

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Demographic Information
AccessRights
PrivacyInformation
LearningGoal
Knowledge Assessment
Learning Style
AH system stores information
User
AH system compiles KIs
AH system compiles pre-test
Estimation of users knowledge
AH system adjusts KIs
AH system compiles curriculum
AH system adjusts user model
AH system compiles final
AH system evaluates final
provides enrollment information
performes pre-test
provides traits
User Model
User Info
Course Info
Estimation of users knowledge
L
Eligibility for Final Test
Demographic
Learning style
O
J
D
A
G
B
E
Access
Test history
H
T
G
H
E
J
Privacy
A
Final test
B
O
A
G
B
D
E
H
O
J
L
T
T
Learning Goal ? Knowledge Items
Test results
used for adaptation effect
Test results are used for revising the user model.
Final test
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• Technical Implementation
• Learner Environment

Authoring Tool
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• Authoring Tools
• general course setting
• views of KIs
• abbreviated version of the core explanation
  (short)
• for novice users (basic)
• very detailed high-level textual explanation
  (main)
• for graduate level knowledge (advanced)
• multiple-choice questions
• fill-in-the-blank questions
• descriptive / online examples
• prerequisites KI
• metadata keywords, semantic
• Teaching Tools
• student registration, performance, question
  analysis

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• Learner Environment
• General design approach follows Mark Weisers
  idea
• The most profound technologies are those that
  disappear. They weave themselves into the fabric
  of everyday life until they are indistinguishable
  from it.
• Scientific American, 265(3)94--104, September
  1991

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• Learner Environment
• Overview page
• background about the subject of the course
• explanation about the concept of AH
• introduction to personal tutor
• acknowledgements

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• Learner Environment
• Emotional Intelligence?
• show emotional behavior (e.g. the persona-effect,
  help relieve frustration, recover to a positive
  emotional state)
• ? beneficial for tutoring agents and learning
  software
• C Elliot, J.C. Lester, J. Rickel. Integrating
  affective computing into animated tutoring agents
  
• In Proceedings of the IJCAI Workshop on Animated
  Interface Agents
• Nagoya, Japan, 1997, 113121
• ? improve user acceptance
• J. Klein. Computer Response to User Frustration.
  TR480, MIT, 1998

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• Learner Environment
• user model is dynamic and is continuously revised
• not based on the content reviewed
• Beaumont 1994
• Boyle and Encarnacion 1994
• Vassileva 1996
• Henze et al. 2002

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LearningGoal
User
AH system re-compiles curriculum
User Model
User Info
Course Info
Estimation of users knowledge
L
Demographic
Learning style
D
Access
Test history
G
H
J
E
Privacy
A
B
O
A
U
F
K
R
S
T
M
Learning Goal ? Recompile Knowledge Items
New curriculum
User changes learning goal.
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• Annotations
• feedback is encouraged
• annotations informal continuous formative
  evaluation
• ? all KIs are annotatable by learners
• Henze et al. 2002

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• Design
• cross platform, all browsers
• screen resolutions with a minimum of 800x600
  pixel
• Guidelines of the Design of Educational Software
  
• ANSI Standards Committee on Dental Informatics

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• Technology

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• PHP Scripting
• // check what is up with prerequisites
• if(prereq!"disregard")
• queryPrereq "select Requires from
  AH_Prerequisites where KI'KIID'"
• dbPrereq-query(queryPrereq)
• if(dbPrereq-num_rows())
• querygetKI "select AH_Knowledge_Items.KI_tit
  le, AH_Knowledge_Items.KIID from
  AH_Prerequisites, AH_Knowledge_Items where
  AH_Prerequisites.KI'KIID' and
  AH_Prerequisites.RequiresAH_Knowledge_Items.KIID"
  
• dbgetKI-query(querygetKI)
• KItitlewithlink""
• while(dbgetKI-next_record())
• vKI_title dbgetKI-Record"KI_title"
• vKIID dbgetKI-Record"KIID"
• scoregetscore(vKIID, UserID)

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• Evaluation
• initial review (cognitive walkthroughs )
• alpha-test (task-oriented)
• formative evaluation (heuristic evaluation
  end-user testing)
• summative evaluation (end-user testing) planned

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• Cognitive Walkthroughs
• Goal solve anticipated problems before bringing
  the course to users for testing
• - performed independent and under observation of
  the developer
• Results (encountered problems were fixed
  immediately )
• - confusing labels of fields
• - confusing options during enrollment
• - missing guidance on start page
• - repetition of test questions
• - inadequate feedback for wrong answers

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• Alpha Test
• task-oriented alpha test
• complete the course
• determine deficiencies (educational,
  instructional design, technical, design and
  layout)
• send an unstructured informal feedback
• Results (encountered problems were fixed
  immediately )
• - general feedback was positive
• - personal tutor concept was beneficial
• - 12 specific usability, functionality issues
  were discovered (regarding change of setting,
  annotations, quiz, flow, sequencing)

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• Formative Evaluation I
• Usability Inspection Heuristic Evaluation
• general heuristic for UI design (Jakob Nielsen)
• heuristic extracted from ANSI standard
  Guidelines for the Design of Education
  Software http//di.dental.pitt.edu/edswstd/

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• In-Class Assignment
• Evaluate the pre- and post-questionnaires
• Problems/Critique
• Order of questions
• Comparing terms
• Formatting
• Disclaimer

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• Formative Evaluation II
• End-user testing
• separation between delivery (media) and
  instructional method
• use of a validated instrument
• ? Evaluation of
• participants reactions
• achievement of program objectives
• changes in student learning
• values
• motivations
• ability to transfer knowledge acquired outside
  the instructional setting

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• Conclusions
• applying of established principles of AH research
• state-of-the-art programming environment
• separation of content and design
• Web-based delivery system
• For the first time, a dental educational delivery
  system adapts itself dynamically using active and
  passive curriculum sequencing and adaptive
  presentation.
• authoring process challenge
• Brusilovsky, Eklund, and Schwartz 2002
• De Bra and Calvi 1998