1. University “Politehnica” of Bucharest I-TRACE PROJECT 2nd Partners Meeting, Potsdam, June 8-9, 2006 Artificial Intelligence and Multi-Agent Systems Laboratory http://turing.cs.pub.ro/ai_mas

2. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 What we have done A1. Investigate the use of pen-based input and graphical interaction to understand how annotational capabilities may be used for educational activities:  What does exist? (documentation)  Use of annotation techniques in computer science  What is to be done next A2. Study the impact of hand-written note-taking, sketching, and graphical annotation on learner's preferences, learning styles, and the provided added value:  In progress A4. Use of pen based input and graphical interaction for creating cognitive maps:  What does exist? (documentation)  Use of cognitive maps and pen-based input to improve educational activities  What is to be done next

3. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 Use annotational capabilities for educational activities Survey of existing techniques and pedagogical approaches  Focus on the use of pen-based input and graphical interaction in teaching computer science – review of 16 articles  Facilitate the development of active and collaborative learning  Supports both traditional and interactive lectures  Used in student evaluation and submissions of solutions  Pedagogical techniques: annotate slides by hand-writing, answer questions and share answers, team work, learning by doing  Why important in CS: annotated diagrams, hand-written graphical solutions

4. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 Use annotational capabilities for educational activities Survey of existing techniques and pedagogical approaches Possible problems/challenges  legibility, color usage and clutter of ink which affect the comprehensibility of the presentation  the frequent use of ink in a manner analogous to physical gestures  the tension between the ephemeral meaning of ink and its persistent representation on the display  the moderate use of system features by the instructors

5. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 Use annotational capabilities for educational activities Software reviewed  14 products: open source, free, proprietary  Summarised by:  Description and features  Platform  Licence  Documentation  Community support  Overall rating http://turing.cs.pub.ro/pen_tech/

6. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 Use annotational capabilities for educational activities Technologies used PC tablets or other pen-based devices + digital ink Desktop applications + multicast – frequent Real time or asynchronous Web annotation - textual and graphical annotations systems for web, but none of them had support for digital ink

7. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 Use annotational capabilities for educational activities What is to be done next  A course module and assessment module on Data Structures and Algorithms using digital ink, based on our own software  A set of good practices of use of hand-written note-taking, sketching, and graphical annotation of teaching materials in Computer Science with focus on DSA = summarize documentation on experience and systems + our own experience with the DSA course  Evaluate effectiveness of the approach

8. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 Use of pen based input and graphical interaction for creating cognitive maps Survey of existing techniques and pedagogical approaches  Concept maps are used to stimulate idea generation, and are believed to aid creativity.  Increase of meaningful learning  Retention of information  Integration of new knowledge with existing knowledge  Can be modified as new concepts are learned so that misconceptions will not persist.

9. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 Use of pen based input and graphical interaction for creating cognitive maps Can be used in:  Summarizing Readings  Summarizing Lectures  Making Notes in a Seminar  Reviewing for an Exam  Working on an Essay  Creative Writing

10. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 Use of pen based input and graphical interaction for creating cognitive maps Software reviewed  13 products: open source, free  Summarised by:  Description and features  Platform  Licence  Documentation  Overall rating http://turing.cs.pub.ro/concept_maps/

11. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 Use of pen based input and graphical interaction for creating cognitive maps Technologies used All reviewed products do not use digital ink Classical input for creating cognitive maps: advantages + disadvantages Challenge: Use digital ink to draw cognitive maps – many benefits - easily express ideas - rapidity - easily accessible

12. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 Use of pen based input and graphical interaction for creating cognitive maps What is to be done next  An interactive module to construct cognitive maps using both classical and pen based input  A set of relevant good practices of use of cognitive maps to enhance learning efficiency  Integrate in the DSA course  Evaluate effectiveness of the approach

13. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 More next steps What is to be done next  A minimal set of relevant features for characterising the learner’s preferences and the learning style, particularly focussed on graphical interaction techniques.  Conduct several experiments with a target group of 50 students at DCS  Survey results of A3 and A5  Disseminate project results

14. I-TRACE PROJECT, 2nd Partners Meeting, Posdam, June 8-9, 2006 A1. Investigate the use of pen-based input and graphical interaction to understand how annotational capabilities may be used for educational activities: A2. Study of the impact of hand-written note-taking, sketching, and graphical annotation on learner's preferences, learning styles, and the provided added value A3. Evaluation of the interfaces allowing pen-based graphical interaction based on the outcome of A1 A4. Use of pen based input and graphical interaction for creating cognitive (mind) maps for:  summarising lectures  supplementary readings A5. Evaluation of the added value and impact of the use of cognitive maps on increasing efficiency of the learning process