The Effect of Interaction Granularity on Learning with a Data Normalization Tutor

Type of content
Conference Contributions - Published
Thesis discipline
Degree name
Publisher
University of Canterbury. Computer Science and Software Engineering
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Language
Date
2013
Authors
Weerasinghe, A.
Mitrovic, Antonija
Shareghi Najar, A.
Holland, J.
Abstract

Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITSs) have proven their effectiveness in many instructional domains, ranging in the complexity of domain theories and tasks students are to perform. The typical effect sizes achieved by ITSs are around 1SD, which are still low in comparison to the effectiveness of expert human tutors. Recently there have been several analyses done in order to identify the factors that contribute to success of human tutors, and to replicate it in ITSs. VanLehn [6] proposes that the crucial factor is the granularity of interaction: the lower the level of discussions between the (human or artificial) tutor and the student, the higher the effectiveness. We investigated the effect of interaction granularity in the context of NORMIT, a constraint-based tutor that teaches data normalization. Our study compared the standard version of NORMIT, which provided hints in response to errors, to a version which used adaptive tutorial dialogues instead. The results show that the interaction granularity hypothesis holds in our experimental situation, and that the effect size achieved is consistent with other reported studies of a similar nature.

Description
The final publication is available at link.springer.com
Citation
Weerasinghe, A., Mitrovic, A., Shareghi, A., Holland, J. (2013) The Effect of Interaction Granularity on Learning with a Data Normalization Tutor. Memphis, TN, USA: 16th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Education, 9-13 July 2013. Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence, 7926, 463-472.
Keywords
effectiveness of ITSs, interaction granularity hypothesis, empirical study, tutorial dialogues, NORMIT
Ngā upoko tukutuku/Māori subject headings
ANZSRC fields of research
Fields of Research::39 - Education::3904 - Specialist studies in education::390405 - Educational technology and computing
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