1. Distance Education Network & Information Sciences Institute USC Viterbi School of Engineering Presented by Erin Shaw Research Computer Scientist Center for Research in Technology for Education USC Information Sciences Institute

2. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Research @ DEN  DEN collaborates with USC research centers  Develop new technologies  Provide greater visibility for DEN  Integrated Multimedia Sciences Center  Multimedia applications  Information Sciences Institute  Collaborative technologies  Interactive simulations  Pedagogical agents

3. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Discussion board initiative Theme and Goals  Create a platform for bridging research and practice  Increase opportunities for  Learner participation and collaboration  Instructor experimentation and assessment  Support the evaluation of advanced technologies  Text mining  Mobile learning  Pedagogical agents  Natural language understanding

4. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities DEN & ISI integrated system ISI Discussion Board Agent Interventions ISI Document Database DEN Blackboard System Student Collaboration Tools DEN File System Instructor Assessment Tools Real-Time Analysis Completed In Development Planned

5. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities DEN Blackboard link to ISI discussion board

6. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Discussion board, Fall 2005

7. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Document-based discussion

8. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Document section-based discussion

9. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities New message notification sent User queries BBS for details Mobile discussion via instant messaging

10. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Mobile communication T*Mobile Sidekick Cingular Nokia 3595 Working Assets Sprint LG 1200 AOL Instant Messenger communication Worked on all phone types tested AT&T Samsung x427

11. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Automated question-answering Goal  Automatically answer  Repeatedly asked questions  Questions whose answers are available in course documents Traditional  Factiod questions  Who is the president of the United States?  Questions contain only one sentence  Answers can be given with short phrase Our challenge  Questions may contain multiple sentences  Questions may not be obvious  I’ve been having trouble….. Can anyone help?  Answers need explanation

12. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Automated question-answering Questions Posted Response Displayed Feature Extraction Similarity Computation Summarization & Answer Extraction Course Documents

13. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Total text available Message Threads Message Posts DocumentsDoc. Tiles Avg. Tiles per Doc. 12363093279282610.13 Course documents Include notes, assignments, web pages, readings Segmented into sections (tiles) Discussion threads Individual messages manually annotated

14. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Classify 3000+ messages by speech act CodeNameDescription QUESQuestionQuestion on specific problems COMMCommandCommand or announcement DESCDescribeDescribe a fact or situation CANSComplex Answer An answer requiring a full description of procedures, reasons, etc. SANSSimple Answer An answer with short phrase or words, e.g. factoid, Yes/No ELABElaborateElaborate on a previous arguments or questions CORRCorrectCorrect a wrong answer/solution with new one OBJObject Object to some argument/suggestions/ solutions SUGSuggestGive advices/suggestions for some problems/solutions SUPSupportSupport others’ arguments/solutions ACKAcknowledgeConfirm or acknowledgement

15. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Compute speech act transition probabilities P(SA|prev_SA)ACKCANSCOMMCORRDESCELABOBJQUESSANSSUGSUPEND START000.01800.184000.78800.0100 ACK0.0290000.014 00.04300 0.857 CANS0.0440.00800.0130.0050.0760.0210.15400.0160.0290.634 COMM0.06300000.18800.43800.250.0630 CORR0.03800 000.077000.0380.769 DESC0.0590.0360 0.0240.0830.0360.24900.2840.1360.059 ELAB0.0520.09100.00600.14300.1170.0130.0710.0130.494 OBJ00.02700.0540.02700.0810.0540 0.1080.595 QUES0.010.34900.0050.0030.0570.0070.0720.0570.3170.0320.089 SANS0.034000000.0170.08500.01700.847 SUG0.040.00700.0110.0040.0520.0220.1680.0020.0450.040.608 SUP0.0090.037000.00900.0190.05600.0650.0830.722

16. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Probabilities constrain search space Today Display best match Next step Evaluate Relevant, useful?

17. den.usc.edu China Radio & TV Universities Thank you for your attention. Enjoy the rest of your visit! Please feel free to contact me: Erin Shaw, shaw@isi.edu shaw@isi.edu