ICADS '23 talk: Performance-based content generation for language learning

ICADS ’23: Second International Conference on Applied Data Science Invited talk For access to past video webinars or to join our Dlist to hear about future programs, please visit https://r6.ieee.org/scv-cs

Generation of appropriate content for serious/educational games is an extremely important concept since it can make all the difference between adoption and retainment of the game, which increase the possibility to achieve its learning objectives and attrition. In the iRead project, Dr. Karpouzis and team are creating a serious game and supporting applications for entry-level language learning. Content for the game is generated based on language models for each school year, learning models (sequencing of features that need to be mastered) and student performance with respect to each language feature. Several teaching and learning objectives are enforced through rules which govern content generation, such as fostering motivation and efficacy, promoting accuracy before automaticity, and allowing revision of already mastered language features. The main takeaway of the proposed lecture will be a flexible way to model language, teaching priorities and student mastery, allowing for personalized learning and student analytics. This modelling approach can be extended to different languages, as long as each of them can be modelled as a set of features, taught sequentially; based on that, personalized content selection may be used to select words, sentences or passages of text, suited for each student based on their performance and teacher-selected learning objectives. For access to past video webinars or to join our Dlist to hear about future programs, please visit https://r6.ieee.org/scv-cs