CA-OLE- A Collaborative And Adaptive Online Learning Environment

Abstract

Demand for online learning environments has grown in the past few years, and schools have been offering more distance courses to their students. Designing adequate online learning environments is considerably more challenging than conventional Face-To-Face courses; therefore traditional methods can not be used. This thesis proposes the creation of a Collaborative and Adaptive Online Learning Environment (CA-OLE) that provides a structure where instructors can combine their lesson materials with an adaptive system and collaborative tools. CA-OLE innovative approach consists of an adaptive framework that changes the way the learning materials prepared by instructors are presented to the students depending on the student individual performance. By adapting presentation and content we show how the learning skills and methods are improved. CA-OLE also integrates a collaborative forum where students can interact with other peers by sharing comments about the specific subject they are working on. Besides, CA-OLE allows for group formation by placing students with similar level of knowledge on the same group. By allowing collaboration between students within the group, teamwork and group effort develops and the learning experience improves. In general, we show how the adaptation of presentation and content, as well as the collaboration between the different actors improves their learning skills and methods, as well as their knowledge on the concepts presented and evaluated