Friday 28/09/2012
14:00 – 16:30
B.3. Special Session on
Intelligent e-learning systems for advanced learning scenarios
Chair: P. Malatestas – C. Patrikakis –J. Psaromiligos – M. Rangoussi – A. Spyridakos
B.3.1. From virtual laboratories to remote laboratories: an Analog Electronics Lab case study in Technological Education
I. Kokkaliaris, St. Potirakis, M. Rangoussi
Department of Electronics Eng., TEI Piraeus, Greece
Abstract
Virtual and Remote Laboratories are two different approaches to the modern need for advanced technological education and laboratory experimentation at a reduced cost and with high accessibility. Virtual Lab solution simulates the experimental process, equipment and materials and offers the user practice as he interacts with the simulation via a Graphics User Interface, either locally or remotely. Remote Lab solution involves remote control of actual rather than virtual equipment for the realization of experiments in a physically existing and operating lab. A hybrid educational scenario that exploits the benefits of both approaches is designed and developed in this work. An analog electronics course lab serves as the test case where both approaches are implemented and tested by a group of TEI Piraeus students, with successful results.
B.3.2. Fuzzy cognitive maps as a tool for e-learning courses modeling, design and evaluation
A.Charitopoulos(1), M. Rangoussi(1), D. Koulouriotis(2).V. Tourasis(2)
(1)Department of Electronics Eng., TEI Piraeus, Greece
(2)Department of Production Management Eng., DemocritusUniversity of Thrace, Greece
Abstract
Fuzzy cognitive maps are recognized as a valuable tool for modeling and simulation of dynamic systems and the processes involved in their operation. Cognitive Mapping constitutes a mature approach that is already employed in fields as diverse as engineering, production and management, work flow control, knowledge management, etc. The injection of fuzzy characteristics in the original Cognitive Mapping notion renders FCMs appropriate for applications where qualitative rather than quantitative characteristics prevail in the modeling of their state and operation. Economics and Education are typical such examples. The present work focuses on the laboratory education process in tertiary technological education and employs FCMs for the design, modeling and evaluation of the courses delivered and the learning outcomes (skills) expected. A stepwise methodology is proposed and evaluated, for the modeling of various aspects of the laboratory educational process via FCMs, with emphasis on the collaborative nature of modern laboratory instruction.
Keywords: Fuzzy Cognitive Maps, Laboratory Instruction, Collaborative learning, Educational process modeling, evaluation of learning outcomes (skills).
B.3.3. Philanagnosia: a generic web environment designed for educational collaboration
A. Tziavas(1), M. Rangoussi(2), A. Papantoniou(2)
(1) 8thPublicPrimary School Teacher (M.Ed.) & Director, Byron-Athens, Greece
(2)Department of Electronics Eng., TEI Piraeus, Greece
Abstract
Literature can contribute to the intellectual and aesthetic culture of young students and transform them from passive into critical readers and thinking individuals - future citizens. “Philanagnosia” and the friendly relationship to books and to book reading in general, if developed and nurtured in the early years of (school) life, will most probably last a lifetime, thus maximizing its benefits. From a different aspect, technology has penetrated all dimensions of human activity, such as science, economy, production, fine arts; it would therefore be impossible that it be absent from education. Computers, the Internet and educational software developed are new tools and challenges for the teacher and the student as they introduce new roles and mediate the process of transmission and acquisition of knowledge. These thoughts have prompted this work, which aims to explore the relationship between the two poles of philanagnosia and new technologies in education for primary school age. Google Sites technology was engaged as the major tool in order to investigate this relationship and to form the basis of both an educational software application on philanagnosia and for interactive support activities to cultivate philanagnosia.
Keywords: Philanagnosia, web-based learning environment, collaborative learning, Google Web Sites.
B.3.4. A generic, web based electronic course platform for distant learning and remote experimentation
Kl. Prekas, S. Vassiliadis, M. Rangoussi, P. Kyrousis and G. Prekas
Department of Electronics Eng., TEI Piraeus, GREECE
Abstract
Laboratory work and experimentation is an essential part of the education experience in all engineering and science study programs at the secondary and tertiary education levels. Laboratory equipment and its maintenance constitute a major expense in cost and time effort. Virtual Laboratories and Remote Laboratories are two different paths sought in an attempt to reduce costs. Remote Laboratories represent a technologically highly demanding solution for the actual sharing of costly equipment via remote access and use by different users or institutions. It is based on a computer-controlled set of actual (not virtual) equipment that can be accessed and operated remotely over a LAN or the Internet. Managing of a remote lab is a demanding task, both due to time-sharing and to safety / security requirements. Inthis work a generic, computer-based system formanaging laboratory equipment is developed and applied to a set of educational laboratory setups, with successful operation results.
Keywords:E-learning, remote laboratory management, laboratory equipment sharing, generic web-based platform, remote experimentation.
B.3.5. “Developing Collaboratively E-Learning Content with QuickLessons: An empirical evaluation study in Greece”,
C. Kitagias(1), P. Georgiakakis(2), Y. Psaromiligkos(1), A. Spyridakos(1), G. Dimakos(3), S. Retalis(2)
(1) Τechnological EducationInstitute of Piraeus, Dpt. of Mathematics, P.Ralli & Thivon 250, Aigaleo, Athens, , ,
(2)University of Piraeus, Department of Digital Systems, M. Karaloi & A. Dimitriou 80, 185 34 Piraeus, ,
(3)University of Athens, Pedagogical Department of Primary Education, Navarinoy 13A, Athens,
Abstract
There is recently a new tendency in the area of course authoring tools and more specific in the way they use to develop and offer an online course. Today, more and more vendors offer the underlying course authoring environment as an on-line service over the Internet which means that anyone can develop content for his/hers lessons anywhere, at anytime, even with a mobile device. QuickLessons is a collaborative rapid development course authoring tool based on the Internet that allows the on-line creation, management and sharing of interactive multimedia content by teachers-authors without previous programming experience or skills in graphic design. The paper shows the context under which the particular tool was used and evaluated by a set of 46 postgraduate students mostly teachers from primary and secondary education. The results of the evaluation showed extremely high rates of acceptance of the tool by the students-authors who managed to develop in a collaborative manner online courses with high quality aesthetics and functionality by taking full advantage of the features of the tool.
Keywords: Collaborative development, web-based course authoring environment, development of multimedia learning content, course authoring tools, QuickLessons.
B.3.6.“Motivating Students with Web2.0 Tools: A Case Study in Primary Education”,
S. Kakkou(1), Y. Psaromiligkos(2), A. Spyridakos(2), G. Dimakos(1), I. Vrettos(1)
(1) University of Athens, Pedagogical Department of Primary Education, Navarinou 13a, Athens, Greece, , ,
(2) Τechnological Education Institute of Piraeus, Department of Mathematics, P.Ralli & Thivon 250, Egaleo-Athens, Greece, ,
Abstract
Today, Web2.0 tools concentrate a growing interest by the educational community worldwide. A large number of Web2.0 applications are currently on the availability of a teacher at any level of education. However, there is a lack of a methodological approach on how a teacher can select and implement in classroom Web2.0 tools that satisfy in an efficient way the requirements of the underlying educational problem. In this paper we present a design and implementation effort in practice of Web2.0 tools in the context of interdisciplinary project in Primary education. We discuss how the educational scenario in conjunction with the corresponding tools motivated the students to engage in depth with the underlying project and developed a high quality set of learning products. A set of different Web2.0 tools such as prezi, tagxedo, goanimate, sploder, youtube, CODEBOX, weebly, etc. were used which enabled students to present their work using many, different and innovative ways. The project involved 11 students from classes D, E and F along with 7 teachers during the school year 2011-2012 in the private school of “Delasal” (ellinogalliki, Saint-Paul), Alimos, Attiki.
Keywords: collaborative development course authoring environment, development of multimedia learning content, course authoring tools, QuickLessons.
B.3.7.“Designing Learning Scenarios using ICT for Teaching English Language in A & B grade of Primary School”,
C. Skorpidea(1), Y. Psaromiligkos(2), A. Spyridakos(2), G. Dimakos(1), I. Vrettos(1)
(1) University of Athens, Pedagogical Department of Primary Education, Navarinou 13a, Athens, , ,
(2) Τechnological Educational Institute of Piraeus, Department of Mathematics, P.Ralli & Thivon 250, Aigaleo, Athens, ,
Abstract
Designing learning scenarios using ICT for the teaching of English as a foreign language in early school age is a challenge. In the GreekPrimary School the problem has emerged the last years after the introduction of English as a Foreign Language in the school curriculum in A and B grade. In this paper we firstly analyze the parameters affecting the underlying educational problem (pedagogical-educational-linguistic) and then we describe a set of learning scenarios using ICT that were applied and tested in classroom during the school year 2011-2012 in the 10th Primary school of Aspropyrgos. Conclusions are described in the last part of the paper. The project developed under the postgraduate programme of studies in Educational Technology and Human Resources Development provided by University of Athens, Department of Primary Education in collaboration with Technological Educational Institute of Piraeus, Department of Mathematics.
Keywords: Learning scenarios using ICT, teaching English language in early school age, intercultural awareness, Communicative approach, Task Based Methodology, Total Physical Response, Constructivism, Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.
B.3.8. Video tutorial creation for learning support. Software and operating systems. A key study of electronics engineering educators department
O. Tigas(1), S. Panetsos(1), P. Psathopoulou(2)
(1)Electronics Engineering Educators Dpt., ASPETE,Iraklion, GR-14121, Athens
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(2)Technological Education Institute of Athens, GR-12210 Egaleo-Athens
Abstract
The creation of mini tutorials for applications and solving issues skills with video capturing method can be used for learning online support. We made a short key study about the acceptance or not of the effort from the students and if they are familiar with video tutorials. In this paper with the term tutorial we refer to the method of giving knowledge which can be used as a part of learning procedure.
B.3.9. Introducing interactivity into TV children shows
Anastasios Tsilikounas and Charalampos Patrikakis
Department of Electronics Eng., TEI Piraeus, Greece
Abstract
Up to now, there has been a clear distinction between the children shows appearing on TV, and the interactive children games, running on personal computers and mobile devices. The introduction of new means of human computer interaction (i.e. Kinect) have rendered blurred the separating line, giving the opportunity to TV broadcasted content to be interactive. In this paper we will describe an architecture for achieving this, while presenting a characteristic use case.
Keywords:Interactive TV, digital content broadcasting, interactive electronic games, TV children shows, Kinect technology.
B.3.10. Teaching technical courses to small children through the combination of traditional and modern (ICT supported) teaching methods
Loukas Koutsikos, Vasiliki Holeva and Charalampos Patrikakis
Department of Electronics Eng., TEI Piraeus, Greece
Abstract
In this paper, based on previous work on the teaching of programming to children of small ages, we present some ideas on combining traditional teaching methods with ICT inspired methods, in order to improve the understanding of technical terms from the children. For this reason, the use of particular tools for designing and implementing a use case scenario is reported, together with the rationale behind this attempt, and a possible use case.
Keywords: Blended teaching approach, ICT-supported teaching, educational scenarios, primary education, technical courses
B.3.11. Elementary and Secondary Teacher’s Blogging Activities in Greece
Thereza Giakoumatou(1) and Agis Papantoniou(2)
(1)MSc “ICT for Education”, Faculty of Early Childhood Education, Univ. of Athens
(2)Department of Electronics Eng., TEI Piraeus, Greece
,
Abstract
Inthispaper, asurveyaboutblogsdevelopedbyEducators of Elementary and Secondary Education in Greece is being presented. Thesurveyisbrokendowninto 2 mainparts. Inthefirstpart, thesurveyrevealstheactiveblogs, showingtheircharacteristics while in thesecondparttheoutcomesof a survey questionnaire, issued to active bloggers, are being presented. Fromthestatisticalprocessingoftheseoutcomesithasbeenfound out that blogs for educational purposes were chosen mainly from teachers whose instructions are based on text, most of them being males during their productive age. It has also been noted a positive relationship with the Educational Program of the Greek Ministry of Education, as it relates to ICT.
Keywords:Educational blogs, blogging, practices, motivation, online identity
B.3.12. @ccounting: A Cloud / SaaS Accounting Application
Maria Chelmi and C. Angeli
TEI of Piraeus, Department of Accounting, General Department of Mathematics, P.Ralli & Thivon 250, Egaleo, Athens, Greece, E-mail:
Abstract
In the recent years, the ever growing sector of Informatics provides a diverse range of tools that can be used to create applications that will serve Accountancy. Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is a new software delivery model that offers the functionality of a service completely deployed in the cloud environment and is characterized by its multi-tenancy architecture. Software applications and solutions that are based on SaaS infrastructure are gaining momentum all over the world and in multiple fields. In this paper, we present @ccounting, a web-based SaaS accounting application that is designed to provide the functionality of a traditional ERP system as well as implement advanced auditory functions (cost analysis, fraud detection). We will present the benefits of using SaaS in this business context and discuss the features of the application.
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