flexible virtual environments for teaching and learning

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Flexible Virtual Environments for Teaching and

Learning

Leonardo Santos, Alberto Castro

Federal University of Amazonas (UFAM)

Brazil

[email protected], [email protected]

Credin Silva de Menezes

Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS)

Brazil

[email protected]

Abstract Distance learning boosts the development of Web-

based software aimed at supporting teaching and learning

processes. More recently, information technology became part of

pedagogies since their conception, especially for those called

pedagogical architectures focused mainly on learning and on

the processes of creation, discovery and invention. This scenario

presented a new challenge: software tools need to facilitate the

expression of individual idiosyncrasies and teams as well as

incorporate multiple fine-tuned ways of working. It becamenecessary to design flexible virtual environments that meet the

needs of its users, allowing runtime changes in their structures

and interfaces. In this paper we present a platform designed

under a novel paradigm for designing virtual environments, with

flexibility to be combined and to define several virtual

environments, runtime changeable without loss of data. As proof

of concept, a software platform was developed and used to model

and implement a total of 11 well-known virtual environments

spanning from usual ones like forum, blog and wiki, to more

complex examples. Finally, in order to evaluate the platforms

ability to accommodate changes, a case-study was carried out in a

real-world event with a class of 10 multipliers (teachers

responsible for training other teachers) that reported their use of

the platforms resources available so far.

Keywords- Distance Learning, Flexible Virtual Environments,

Tailorability

I. INTRODUCTION

In the last ten years, the Web has changed from an ordinary

medium to a complex platform, from a read-web to a read-

write-web and these days Web 2.0s ideas are in line with

modern educational theories such as constructivism and

connectionism, making its applications very attractive for

teachers and learners [1]. This is fulfilling Berners-Leesoriginal vision of the Web a system in which sharing what

you knew or thought should be as easy as learning whatsomeone else knew [2].

Although technical characteristics of those tools lead

to specific pedagogical characteristics especially whenconsidering Distance Learning scenarios, traditional learning

management systems (LMS) tend to replicate conventional

forms of teaching, especially on its focus on content

organization and student activity management, both issues

based on a knowledge-transfer perspective.

More recently, some pedagogical approaches take

into account the technological support since its conception.

This is the case with pedagogical architectures [3] that are

focused mainly on learning and on the processes of creation,

discovery and invention, as well as encouraging subjects to

perform experiments and simulations while searching forsolutions to significant problems connected through different

situations.

This scenario presented a new challenge: software

tools need to facilitate the expression of individual

idiosyncrasies and teams as well as incorporate multiple fine-

tuned ways of working. In a collaborative context, softwaredevelopers are not able to predict all user needs at design time

[4]. That means that even if a developer is able to develop an

optimal application for a group, it will eventually become

inadequate due to new situations and problems that eventually

will appear [5]. Thus, users should be able to adapt their

applications according to their pace and work methods [4]. Itbecame necessary to design flexible virtual environments that

meet the needs of its users, allowing runtime changes in their

structures and interfaces.

Developers of virtual environments tackle this

problem by using approaches like component-baseddevelopment, software production lines and web-services-

based services. However, they do not manage to deal with the

kind of dynamic modification their users are now demanding.

All these approaches take an application as a finished product,

without need for modifications after it is ready for use. These

approaches are still not flexible enough to tackle new demands

of highly dynamic domains.

In this context, a distinct approach called MOrFEu

(from a Portuguese acronym for Flexible Multi-Organizer of

Virtual Spaces) was proposed and has been evolving [6][7].

MOrFEus perspective is that virtual environments should be

composed of simple elements that, when combined, can define

tools for communication, interaction, organization ofknowledge and so on. This simplicity of composition gives

MOrFEu-based tools, flexibility to define several virtual

environments, which are runtime changeable without loss of

data.

In this paper we describe a web-based softwareplatform developed upon MOrFEus perspective and aimed at

highly dynamic collaborative scenarios. This platform is

described here using a Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern

and as proof of concept we implemented a total of 11 well-

known virtual environments, spanning from usual ones like

978-1-4673-1352-0/12/$31.00 2012 IEEE 1388

42nd ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference


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forum, blog and wiki, to more complex examples, used in

pedagogical architectures for which there was no direct

implementation reported. Finally, in order to evaluate thisplatform ability to accommodate changes in its elements, a

case-study was conducted in a real-world event with a class of

10 multipliers (teachers responsible for training other teachers)

that reported their use of resources available so far.

II. R ELATED WORK

Software developers have been addressing suitability of virtual

environments to user needs through techniques such as:

modular development, component-based development,

software product lines and web-services. However, the

problem is still not solved.

Modular development relies upon services, libraries

and frameworks that encourage reuse and focus on the goals

of an application. Among virtual environments developed with

this approach, Moodle1

is one the most used. It has an atomic

core of basic services and all communication and interaction

tools are installed as modules, making easy to install a new

module. However, these modules are available by a developer

community in not so large numbers. If a group of usersdemands modification on any of these modules, all users of

that environment would be affected.

The main idea in component-based development is to

encapsulate many of the technical difficulties faced by virtual

environment developers [8]. The focus of this approach is onthe reuse of infrastructure aspects like protocols, synchronism,

session management and others, leaving time to implement

innovative solutions. Components assembled according to a

group needs imply that a certain virtual environment would be

developed to that specific group. Unsurprisingly this approach

will have limitations when dealing with new demands

resulting from different patterns of interactions and natural

evolution inside the original groups. The works reported in

[9], [10] and [11] are examples of component-based

development.

Software product lines (SPL) present a more

systematic approach than the ad-hoc criteria frequently seen in

component-based [8]. SPL span over all stages of groupware

development and like the component-based approach, it

allows customization of applications, but also it considers a

virtual environment as a finished, unchangeable product.

Virtual environments can also be developed usingweb-services in a distributed architecture. Examples of this

approach are reported in [12] and [13], with development of

applications by composition of distributed services over theWeb. The work reported in [4] proposes a tailorable

groupware architecture that enables the dynamics composition

of services into a collaborative application. Nevertheless, ashappens with the other approaches, there is no thought on how

to modify one of the services, but only how the services might

be composed, dynamically or not.

These approaches are still not flexible enough to

tackle new demands of highly dynamic domains already into

the web.

1 http://moodle.org

In Table I we present a synthesis of the

characteristics of current approaches and of MOrFEus,

considering typical issues like when new tools can beintegrated to an existing environment, how a customized

environment can be made, how an existing tool can be

modified, and how much time is needed to make some

modification.

TABLE I. COMPARISON OF VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENT APPROACHES

Module

based

Component

based

Web

services

MOrFEu

Deployment of

new tools

run-time project-

time

run-time run-time

Customized

environments

no project-

time

run-time run-time

Modification of

existing tools

no project-

time

no run-time

Modification time Slow fast

III. A FLEXIBLE MULTI-ORGANIZER OF VIRTUAL SPACES

MOrFEu [8] has individual production of users as its central

focus, and building virtual environments will be guided by the

organization of that production. Using simple elements,MOrFEu can define a great variety of virtual environments

that can be made flexible and able to deal with runtime

changes in specification.MOrFEu has the following premises:

Users interact with each other through virtualenvironments, in a knowledge construction setting;

Interactions are materialized through user productionstored in these environments;

User production is organized in virtual environmentsas documents, shared according to predefined elementssuch as: structure, responsibility table and interaction

order.

In this way, a basic item of individual productiondoes not need to be subdued by a specific document. The same

production item can be reused to form different group

documents.

Conventional virtual environments organize their

work spaces according to communication/interaction toolsused. Tying up a production to a specific document or tool has

been reason of complaining by a web pioneer that stated:

every time I write something with a computer, I have to

choose whether to open the electronic mailapplication or the

net news application or the Web editorapplication [2].

We introduce the concept ofIntellectual ProductionUnit (IPU) as the basic artifact to support authoring and

registration of individual production. The IPUs can be

produced in different languages, text, graphics, sound, etc., so

that each IPU may be of a different type. Any production

made by a user into an application can be considered an IPU.

For example, forums posts, a blogs comments, an e-mail

message sent to a friend, all of them are IPUs.

In a virtual environment, interaction starts when a

user shares an IPU with others. This leads to another central

concepts in MOrFEu: The act of sharing an IPU in a virtual

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environment is called publishing, and these virtual

environments defined by IPU composition are called

Communication Vehicle (ComV). ComV are responsible formaterialization of production generated by interaction

between users following certain interaction protocols, and

are transposed to user view according to individual templates.

Template is another key concept. Any visualization

of data within a ComVs document is made through a

template. Instantiation of a ComV generates a hypermediadocument jointly generated from publication of organized

IPUs, visualized through templates.

These concepts can be used to describe conventional

communication/interaction tools, as follows:

A chat conversation, for example, will produce adocument (ComV) generated by participants of thatchat session. Posts (IPUs) are usually done one afterother, with no predefined intervention order, carriedout synchronously. Usually a chat has just one page,which is generated by a template.

In a blog, authors create several posts (IPUs) organized

by publication date. Each one of these posts is open toget comments from other users (IPUs), which in theirturn will become co-authors of that document (ComV).Basically, a blog has two kinds of pages (bothgenerated by templates): the main page with a postinglist and the comments for every posting.

In a discussion forum, productions (IPUs) areorganized in tree organization (from graph theory). AnIPU replies to other IPU or starts a new thread of

publication, in a hierarchical way. The final documentin this ComV is the set of all productions in the treestructure. Templates generate a page with the list ofthreads and one page for each thread showing its posts.

IV. PEDAGOGICAL ARCHITECTURES

Aiming at breaking away from conventional praxis around

educational software that of schools adopting artifacts

(contents and program) available off-the-shelf a novel

approach was introduced in [3]. In that work, Pedagogical

Architectures (PA) are described as a matching of a

pedagogical approach (a group-based dynamic driven to

knowledge production, devised to address a specific learning

situation also considering the subjects and a specific context)

with a computational support (software, communication

networks, Artificial Intelligence tools, etc). Thus, is notenough to have a generic pedagogical approach (a meta-PA)

and apply it to a new situation (contents, subjects and context) it is necessary for a PA to be in consonance with its elements

and that it could be modified through its use, in order to

comply with new demands risen from that use.

MOrFEu [6] was proposed to tackle this challenge production of software artifacts for cooperative learning

with the following PA requirements:

A software artifact where is possible to describeinteraction patterns combined with documentgeneration;

Support for supervision and intervention by a teacher;

Support for storage and retrieval of individual andgroup productions;

Resources could be modified and tuned during its use.

V. A PLATFORM FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF FLEXIBLE

VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENTS

Grounded upon MOrFEus principles, we propose a software

platform for developing web-based virtual environments thatmakes it easier to build tailorable social interaction tools,

runtime changeable without loss of data. We discuss how

those principles have been instantiated with current

technology and used to define a platform described and

prototyped using MVC development model [14].

Starting with organization of IPUs published inComVs, behavior and data from the application domain need

to be managed by a moldable element, with a data scheme that

cannot be fixed since it should allow editing or adding new

data types on the model. Conventional relational database are

not suitable for this, once changes on its scheme are inefficientor not allowed at all. NoSQL database are recommended,

especially scheme-free ones, for example XML and

document-based ones.

Each user must have its own way of accessing data,

and several templates will act on a same set of data. For

instance, data in a spreadsheet can be seen in several ways: atable, a row graphic, a pizza graph, a histogram, and so on.

An important element in this platform is related to

management of interaction protocols and regulation of issues

like: user roles, permissions, interaction rules and other

constituents of formally represented workflows.

Functionalities like these are requirements for current social

inspired web applications [5][15][16].Finally, MOrFEus principles state that IPUs exist

independently of where they are published, and should be

available for publishing at any ComV. Thus, there should be

an IPU Database managed by the system and in ComV there

are references (publications) to IPUs that constitute it. A MVC

representation of these elements can be seen on Figure 1.

Controller

- CRUDP actions- Roles- Permissions

- Interaction Flow

Model

- FlexibleSchema

View

- Program /

Script

HTMLPage

ComV

Queries data

Changes data

Controls

IPUs

- entiresystem

HTTPRequisition

Browser

Figure 1. A MVC representation of the platform.

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A Prototype of a MOrFEu-based Platform

Using MVC development model we have implemented a

platform for development of ComVs. In this platform, everyuser can manage their IPUs and related publications. An user

can access existing ComVs and create their own. Every ComV

has its own MVC elements, as follows:

Model: it was implemented through a XML file, storedas an IPU. This model has a flexible scheme and IPUsare published as reference to IPUs on an IPU database.

View: views are IPUs in XSLT a Turing-completeprogramming language for XML processing. Viewsprocess Model and display HTML pages withinformation in the Model.

Controller: CRUDP (Create, Read, Update, Delete +Publish) actions were implemented as well as Viewmanipulations. Permissions deal with authors andreaders of a ComV.

A prototype was implemented using PHP as

programming language and MySQL as DBMS. A PHP

processor with modules for XML/XSLT processing isrequired. A software development framework called Yii

2was

used to speed up the prototype development. The prototype3

can be installed on any Apache-MySQL-PHP hosted either by

Linux or Windows with active XML/XSLT processing on

PHP.

Figure 2 shows the layer architecture of the prototype

with relations between elements.

View Controller

ModelFunctions

Yii Framework

DataBase File System

ComV

IPUs Users

Figure 2. Layer Architecture of the Prototype.

In the prototype there are ComVs already

implemented and they are used as models for new ComVs.

For example, if a user wants to create a discussion forum, they

can copy a model from the standard forum in the system.

Thus, modifications done on a ComV are valid only at each

specific instance. To modify a ComV, a user may use the

ComV editor and alter ComV elements: View, Model andController.

Interface modifications are done through View. On

views also are found the links for IPU publishing and

functions to obtaining system information like name of an user

accessing data, IPU data, date of last modification of a ComV,

etc.

2 http://www.yiiframework.com/3 http://gsiufam.com/

Model modification includes inclusion of publishing

schemata short pieces of XML code that are included in the

model at the moment of publishing.Controller modification can refer to permissions or

configurations. At the prototype, only simple permissions

were implemented like who are authors and readers of a

ComV.Each ComV might have its configuration set adjusted

to match an expected behavior. Simple modifications, likeinterface ones, can be done by the user and requires someknowledge of HTML and ComV architecture. More complexmodifications, like inclusion or modification of ComVfunctionalities might involve several modifications on viewsand model, or even inclusion of new views, and should be done

by developers or more specialized users.

VI. DEVELOPING FLEXIBLE TOOLS FORINTERACTION

As concept proof, we have described and implemented 11

software tools. In this section, we illustrate the ComV

development process, from design up to runtime modifications

in its functionalities. To do that, we show the development

process for a tool supporting a pedagogical architecture called

Thesis Debate (TD) [17].

TD was developed as an experimental activity, in a

stepwise way. After each stage, the following one wasincluded according to what happened in that stage. As a result,

a five-stage activity was devised.

In the first stage the moderator (teacher) selects

theses to be debated from a survey on student previous

knowledge. A chart with the thesis assigned to each student

(stage 2) is prepared and each student must states whetherhe/she agrees or disagrees with it, along with a correspondent

justification. Next (stage 3), each opinion must be evaluated

by two or more members of the group and they must composea short review. In stage 4, authors of the initial justifications

can, if they want to, answer to evaluators comments. At stage

5 users can presented a new/revised version of their positionsand arguments.

Theses Debate

Theses

Thesis*

IPU Argumentations

Argumentation*

IPU Comments

Comment*

IPU

Replica

IPU

Revision

IPU

Note*

IPU

Note*

IPU

Note*

IPU

Figure 3. Data Scheme for Thesis Debate (TD)

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A. Project

Our ComV development platform includes a tool modeling

scheme comprising data modeling and web navigation. Figure3 presents a data model for the discussion chart of TD. Its tree-

like shape makes easier to map it to a XML scheme, using for

it a notation similar to ancient Jackson representation diagram

[18]. On that representation, arrows mean composed by and

a star means one or more. Dotted line represents publication

schemes. Dark colored boxes are modifications after initial

modeling, carried out during runtime. Modification process

will be described later.

Figure 4 shows the navigation diagram (between

webpages) for this tool. It consists of three states: the main

page; a participants list; and charts I have commented.

Parameters are represented along connectors.

Theses Debate

IF not user

THENmy page

ELSE users page

List of Participants

A list of all participants

What I commented

A list of participants that Imade some comment

user

user

Figure 4. Navigation Diagram for a TD tool.

B. Implementation

Implementation process involves development of views,

model and controller. First it is necessary to implement an

initial model and publication schemes in XML. Next comes

the development of a view for each of the three pages, writtenusing XSLT. A view must extract data from the model and

present them as a web page. The view must have links for

publications specifying which publication scheme must be

used, what sort of IPU and where in the model publicationmust be made. It is also possible to show system information

and IPUs currently in the IPU database. Publication links andinformation display are done through a specific function used

by the view processor.

C. Modifications

The first modification tested was the inclusion of text notes for

direct interaction between moderator and participants, a

situation not anticipated in the original version of TD [17]. To

do this, a new Note publication scheme was added (see Figure

3). After that, a publication link was added in the chart for

situation when user is a moderator. In this view an exhibition

code for published notes was also added.Other feature wanted in the tool was suggestion of

charts for evaluation, since each participant should evaluate

only two charts from other participants. Thus, a generation of

a random list of pairs of participants was included.

A third modification was done to parameterize ComV

configurations and allow informing how many charts each

participant should comment upon.These three modifications have been carried out as a

straightforward task a simple programmer working two

hours at each modification. These modifications could be done

by most of the users and are supported by a versioning tool.

As result, Figure 5 shows a chart of one user of this ComV,

generated at the Case Study described in the next section.

D. Using ComV to develop other virtual cooperative tools

As concept proof, we have described and implemented other

10 software tools. Description for some of these tools can be

easily found on the web: forum, blog, wiki, questionnaires,

glossary and whiteboard. For others, there is no specificdescription: simulated jury [19], problem-solving virtual diary[20], soccer world-cup betting tool and a simple LMS-like

course manager. The later spans over various application

contexts and functionalities and are aimed to represent real

world situations. These ComV have from 1 to 4 views and

were implemented by one programmer working up to two

days in each view. The resulting code is about 260 lines foreach view.

Figure 5. A TD runtime modified chart.

VII. FORMATIVE EVALUATION

An exploratory Case Study has been carried out in order to

determine how the platform would tackle real-world demands

for modification. The main goal was to develop hypothesis

and related propositions for a following study on what sort of

virtual environments can be build using the platform.

The scenario for the Case Study was a course with 10multipliers (teachers responsible for training other teachers) on

using of Information and Communication Technology on

elementary school. Those participants had to reach proper

skills level before to go back to their own schools and

replicate the strategies and materials there. All participantsagreed to be observed and to use our prototype.

Among several activities planned for that course,some time was allocated for exploring pedagogical

architectures described here, built using our prototype. Two

tasks were observed: using of Thesis Debate and evaluation of

learning objects using forums to discussion and wiki forreporting. Participants had little knowledge on using internet-

based tools, so the first task had a preliminary step: after

discussing how Thesis Debate works, a structured debate was

done using only 3 participants (the others stayed as observers)

with conventional materials (pen and paper). By the end of the

process, all participants (3 operators and 7 observers) have

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said that it was too complicated to apply that pedagogical

architecture with no computing support.

Next, we presented a Thesis Debate supporting toolbuilt using our prototype and all 10 participants started the

activity. We assisted the participants with technical support

and questions about that pedagogical architecture, taking notes

on all problems reported or functionalities the participants

would like to have on that tool. The same assistance was given

in the second task.By the end of those activities we have identified a

total of 31 modifications. From those, 10 were simple bugs

and 11 were variations on the ComV to better accommodate

personal preferences. All these 21 modifications were easily

done (about 6 working hours) and checked upon by users in

the following day.All remaining modifications were concerned with

variations on the pedagogical architecture, especially

interaction rules, that participants thought would better suit

their application scenarios (students and teachers at their own

school) and not implemented because they require

modifications over the controller, a component not yetincorporating formal definitions allowing runtime alterations

in current prototype.

In addition to these variations on Thesis Debate,

some participants suggested other ComV that they thought

would be used in related contexts like a synchronous,cooperative and multi-operated text editor; or an educational-

oriented social net.

VIII. CONCLUSION

In this paper we described a web-based softwareplatform developed upon a novel software developmentperspective called MOrFEu and aimed at highly dynamiccollaborative scenarios.

Results of a concept proof implementing a total of 11software tools gave evidence of: (1) feasibility of the proposal

there is a running prototype; (2) flexibility of the proposal several tools, in various contexts, were implemented and usedin a real-world situation; (3) ease of use considering theamount of code, time and personnel involved in thedevelopment task.

A Case Study developed as formative evaluation gaveevidence that even non-experts can present a challengingdemand for modification in virtual environments (a need forflexible approaches), which support our initial assumption thateven if a developer is able to develop an optimal application for

a group, it will eventually become inadequate due to newsituations and problems that eventually will appear.

Traditional approaches for development of this kind oftools are not flexible enough, and as we checked in a prototypestage, our platform already allows developers to implementseveral runtime modifications.

Our Case Study also brought out some issues relatedto the interaction protocols of the activities that are supported

by those tools. Therefore, deeper formalization of usertemplates and interaction patterns, as well as other real-worldcase studies are the next steps on this investigation.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

This work had financial support from CNPq, Edital

MCT/CNPq/CT-Amaznia n 55/2008, Proc.575553/2008-1.

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