Authoring Content in the PAT Algebra Tutor

Abstract

Most authoring tools for intelligent tutoring systems are targeted towards a broad range of applications. Such systems have expressive power but gain the complexity inherent in any general programming language. This paper considers a different kind of authoring tool, focused on creating content for a specific intelligent tutoring system. The resulting system, called pSAT, addresses the great demand for continuing development of content. A system like pSAT needs to be easily learned by end-users and needs to provide feedback adequate for the user to be able to determine that the system will correctly present the content under a wide range of user strategies, preferences and abilities. We focus on design principles driven by these considerations and conclude with a development strategy that begins with a closely-focused content authoring system and then broadens to a system that can more fundamentally affect the type of content presented by the intelligent tutoring system.

Supporting teachers as content authors in intelligent educational systems

“…It gives the teachers a feeling of controlling the new technology and is more likely to make them active proponents of it. While the above may be true for almost any advanced educational technology, in the context of knowledge-rich IESs, it is also important that the experience of authoring content enables the teachers to better understand the knowledge embodied in the system and how the system operates (Ritter et al, 1998a). Being an author is important for many teachers.…”

“…It is not surprising that the first implementation of this idea by Ritter et al (1998a) was done in the context of the PAT Algebra Tutor, the first IES that made a leap from the lab to hundreds of classrooms (Koedinger et al, 1995). Later, this idea was also explored in the context of AnimalWatch (Arroyo et al, 2001), another practical algebra tutoring system.…”

“…Claiming that it is not a trick used by a few researchers (Arroyo et al, 2001;Ritter et al, 1998a), but an essential component of the new design paradigm, we want to explore this approach systematically, draw connections to similar works, and finally move beyond the existing narrow area of authoring algebra word problems.…”

“…While the problem of developing external content is less complicated than the one of developing core IES functionality, we must remember that teachers are much less prepared to handle the authoring process than professional IES developers are, and thus they require a significant level of support. The pioneering paper on this issue (Ritter et al, 1998a) provides a good analysis of the problems involved, as well as a set of design principles that have been developed for authoring problems, specifically for a cognitive rule-based tutoring system.…”

A Hierarchical Modular Architecture for Embodied Cognition

“…Their broad intent is to cast a behavior as problem solving and find a sequence of rules that will solve it. Despite the enormous difficulties involved, expert systems have achieved notable successes, particularly in intellectual problems where requisite symbol bindings can be readily modeled, such as in algebraic problem solving (Ritter et al, 1998). However, a crucial area where these systems are somewhat dated is that of perception and action.…”