ADAPT (ADaptive Assistance for Peer Tutoring)
Intelligent tutoring systems have been a successful way of increasing learning in the classroom, but still fall short of the learning gains achieved by expert human tutors. One way to increase the effectiveness of intelligent tutors might be to augment the systems with a reciprocal peer tutoring activity (such as PALS), where students of similar abilities take turns tutoring each other. During peer tutoring, students can interact in more depth about the course material than during typical intelligent tutoring. However, tutors may struggle with giving appropriate help to tutees. If we use intelligent tutoring technology to provide adaptive assistance to the peer tutoring process, we may be able to increase the effectiveness of the collaboration, and consequently increase the learning of the students involved. The first step of this project was to modify the Cognitive Tutor Algebra, an intelligent tutoring system for high-school algebra, so that students could use the interface to tutor each other. We then used the cognitive tutor domain models to provide the peer tutor with adaptive assistance in correctly guiding the tutee through the problem. The next step in the project is to further adaptively support the skills needed to peer tutor effectively.
Walker, E., Rummel., N., and Koedinger, K. R. Walker, E., Rummel, N., and Koedinger, K. R. Towards Intelligent Tutoring of Collaboration: Providing Adaptive Domain Support. To appear in ITS 2008. [pdf]
Walker, E., McLaren, B. M., Rummel, N., and Koedinger, K. R. Who Says Three's a Crowd? Using a Cognitive Tutor to Support Peer Tutoring. Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Education. 2007. [pdf]
Walker, E., Rummel, N., McLaren, B. M. & Koedinger, K. R. The Student Becomes the Master: Integrating Peer Tutoring with Cognitive Tutoring. Short paper at the Conference on Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL-07). Rutgers University, July 16-21, 2007. [pdf]
Walker, E. Mutual Peer Tutoring: A Collaborative Addition to the Cognitive Tutor Algebra-1. Young Researcher's Track paper at the International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Education (AIED-05).