Appel: NLP in support of Learning - Workshop AIED 2009

[Thierry Hamon]

Date: Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:41:57 +0100
From: Virginie Zampa <virginie.zampa at gmail.com>
Message-Id: <4F612965-CBDB-4B91-B982-3967C2C7FD61 at gmail.com>
X-url: http://www.upmf-grenoble.fr/sciedu/nlpsl

Apologies for cross-posting

***************FIRST CALL FOR PROPOSALS:  2/23/09 **********************
Natural Language Processing in support of Learning -- Workshop @ AIED  
2009
July 6 or 7, 2009, Brighton, UK, in conjunction with AIED 2009  
Conference
Contact: nlpsl at upmf-grenoble.fr
web: http://www.upmf-grenoble.fr/sciedu/nlpsl
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1. IMPORTANT DATES
    Submission Deadline: April 16, 2009
    Notification of Acceptance: Mid-May
    Camera-ready papers due date: End of May
    NLPsL Workshop: A half-day on 6 or 7 July, 2009
    AIED Conference: July 8-10, 2009

2. AIMS (more information on the workshop website) In AI-ED research,
providing feedback for learning entails measuring differences among
learners; between learners and their desired characteristics (e.g.,
knowledge, competences, motivation, self- regulation processes); or
between learners and their looked-for resources (e.g. web-links,
articles, courses) has often been performed by computing and analysing
'distances' using several techniques like factorial analysis,
instance-based learning, clustering, and so on.  Corpora on which
these measures are made are all writing-based, that is, are multiple
forms of pieces of evidence such as texts read (written by teachers),
spoken utterances, essays, summaries, forum or chat messages. Some of
these metrics are based on shallow syntactical and morphological
aspects of the interaction and production artefacts (e.g., text
length). Others are focused more on semantic and pragmatic
aspects. These measures are used for providing various kinds of
feedback for supporting learning and connections between learners. For
instance, relations between learners' utterances, knowledge, concept
acquisition, emotional states, essay scores, and even learners
themselves have all been investigated with the help of computing
semantic distances.

The purpose of this workshop is to focus on the latter two – semantics
and pragmatics – by trying to identify what questions and problems are
solved, but also to raise and discuss how well the metrics developed
assist in the provision of support and the construction of feedback
for learning. What are the most efficient ones? To what extent do they
match distances inferred by teachers' assessments? This workshop
addresses the problem of how support can be provided and feedback be
generated for helping students learn.

Several Natural Language Processing techniques like Latent Semantic
Analysis (LSA) or the use of semantic and pragmatic analysis of
conversations have been successfully deployed in various educational
applications to enrich learning and teaching with information
technology. However, few research approaches considered also in detail
the problem of providing feedback.

3. TOPICS

The topics of this workshop relate on the AI-ED applications of these
techniques and the methodological issues they have raised (e.g., their
selection and validation). Topics should cover the following distance-
based semantic processing techniques in AI-ED research, but are not
restricted to:

Automated essay scoring & grading, Summarization & writing assistance,
such as:

     * Feedback generation, Tutoring & Tutor support, Question
       answering
     * Learner modelling, Enriching user profiles, Peer finding &  
       community formation
     * Positioning & Placement of learners
     * Selection & Sequencing of content
     * Protocol analysis, Knowledge gap analysis, Task analysis

Methodological issues of distance-based semantic processing
techniques, such as:

     * Corpus composition & preparation (sanitising, filtering,  
       selection, seeding, domain modelling, etc.)
     * Optimisation of analysis and queries
     * Statistical properties
     * Combining these techniques with other ones
     * Evaluation and Validation concerns

Cognitive Modelling using distance-based semantic processing
techniques, such as:

     * Knowledge acquisition
     * Language acquisition and development
     * Measure of semantic relatedness
     * Cognitive architectures
     * Activity modelling
     * Cognitive corpora

Analysis, assessment and feedback generation of content and inter-
animation in Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning through chats,
such as:

     * Content analysis of chat conversations
     * Discourse analysis and visualization in chat conversations
     * Identification of discussion and argumentation threads in  
       conversations
     * Identification of inter-animation, transactivity and  
       interactions in chats
     * Assessment of learners' participation in conversations
     * Feedback generation for chats in educational settings

4. COMMITTEES
- Organisational Committee
This workshop is jointly organized and supported by members of the
LTfLL (Language Technologies for LifeLong Learning) EC-funded Research
Project

     * Philippe Dessus (University of Grenoble, France)
     * Stefan Trausan-Matu (UPB, Roumania)
     * Peter van Rosmalen (OUNL, The Netherlands)
     * Fridolin Wild (Vienna University of Economics and Business  
       Administration, Austria)

- Program Committee
     * Jean-Yves Antoine (University of Tours, France)
     * Gaston Burek (Tuebingen University, Germany)
     * Philippe Dessus (University of Grenoble, France)
     * Arthur C. Graesser (University of Memphis, USA)
     * Xiangen Hu (University of Memphis, USA)
     * Mathieu Lafourcade (University Montpellier, France)
     * Benoît Lemaire (University of Grenoble, France)
     * David Meyer (Vienna University of Economics and Business  
       Administration, Austria)
     * Phil McCarthy (University of Memphis, USA)
     * Danielle S. McNamara (University of Memphis, USA)
     * Paola Monachesi (Utrecht University, The Netherlands)
     * Traian Rebedea (UPB, Roumania)
     * Stefan Trausan-Matu (UPB, Roumania)
     * Jan van Bruggen (OUNL, The Netherlands)
     * Peter van Rosmalen (OUNL, The Netherlands)
     * Fridolin Wild (Vienna University of Economics and Business  
       Administration, Austria)
     * Virginie Zampa (University of Grenoble, France)

5. SUBMISSION TYPES (More information on the workshop website)
Submitted papers should describe substantial and unpublished work.
English is the official language for both papers and talks.
Submissions are expected to comply with the AIED paper format. The
submitted papers should be 6-8 pages in length and in PDF format.
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