Appel: Workshop on Natural Language Processing in Support of Learning (extension de deadline)

[Thierry Hamon]

Date: Tue, 29 Jun 2010 18:08:09 +0200
From: Mathieu Loiseau <mathieu.loiseau at u-grenoble3.fr>
Message-Id: <31883E5F-6199-41BF-B273-416367488B0A at u-grenoble3.fr>
X-url: http://k-teams.cs.pub.ro/~nlpsl


Due to some requests, the dealine was extended to 7 July for
submitting papers to the Second CFP Workshop on Natural Language
Processing in Support of Learning: Metrics, Feedback and Connectivity,
Bucharest

Link: http://k-teams.cs.pub.ro/~nlpsl
Organized under the FP7 LTfLL Project
(http://www.ltfll-project.org/)
September 14th 2010, Bucharest,
ROMANIA

Introduction, Aims & Topics

Introduction

In supporting Lifelong Learning (LLL) on the Social Web (Web2.0),
Natural Language Technologies (LT) increasingly play a central role
due to the fact that text is the leading medium of communication and
collaboration. LT cover now a wide range of topics, including advanced
semantic resources and applications like ontologies, knowledge
extraction, text mining, Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Latent
Semantic Analysis (LSA). The peculiarities of Web2.0 impose also the
consideration of using LT for social software (social networks
analysis) and collaborative interactions on chats and forums.
Pragmatics, discourse and conversation analysis are very important
analysis domains.

For LLL, providing feedback 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). Difference measuring often have been performed by
computing and analyzing 'distances' using several techniques like
factorial analysis, instance-based learning, clustering, and so on.
Corpora on which these measures are made are text-based artifacts,
that is to say multiple forms of pieces of evidence such as text
materials (written by teachers), spoken utterances, essays, summaries,
forum or chat messages. Some of the metrics used are based on shallow
syntactical and morphological aspects of the interaction and
production artifacts (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.


Aims

The purpose of this workshop is to focus on using language
technologies in support of learning and teaching - by trying to
identify what questions and problems are solved, but also to raise and
discuss how well the metrics and algorithms developed assist in the
provision of support and the construction of feedback for learning.
What are the most efficient ways? To what extent do they match
distances inferred by a teacher's assessments? The workshop addresses
the problem of how support can be provided and feedback be generated
in order to help students learn and teachers to assess their progress.

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.

The primary goal of the workshop is to bring together experts in the
related fields in order to: Share knowledge (i.e., approaches, models,
issues, solutions) acquired in the domain of using language
technologies for learning Present applications in the domain Present
the achievements of the FP7 project LTfLL (Language Technologies for
Lifelong Learning: http://www.ltfll-project.org/) and other similar
RTD efforts Debate on directions and possibilities of future research
in the domain. - create a forum for further collaboration and develop
an international community on this field of study.


Topics

This workshop continues a previous one with the same name, help at the
Artificial Intelligence in Education (AI-ED) 2009 conference
(Brighton, UK - http://webu2.upmf-grenoble.fr/sciedu/nlpsl/). Another
workshop with a very close purpose has been organized three years ago
in Heerlen at the Open University of the Netherlands
(http://dspace.ou.nl/bitstream/1820/933/1/lsatel07___miniproceedings.pdf).

Topics should cover the following distance-based semantic and
pragmatic processing techniques and applications, but are not
restricted to:

Automated essay scoring & grading, Summarization & writing assistance,
such as: Feedback generation, Tutoring & Tutor support, Question
answering Learner modeling, Enriching user profiles, Peer finding &
community formation Positioning & Placement of learners Selection &
Sequencing of content Protocol analysis, Knowledge gap analysis, Task
analysis Text summarization Plagiarism detection

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

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

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

Knowledge acquisition
Language acquisition and development
Measure of semantic relatedness
Cognitive architectures
Activity modeling
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 and forum discussion threads
Discourse analysis and visualization in chat conversations and forum
discussion threads
Identification of discussion and argumentation threads in
conversations
Identification of inter-animation, transactivity and interactions in
chats
Assessment of learners' participation in conversations and forum
discussion threads
Feedback generation for chats and forum discussion threads in
educational settings


Call for Papers, Paper Format Requirements and Publication Details

Submission Types

Submitted papers should describe substantial and unpublished work.
English is the official language for both papers and talks.
Submissions are expected to have either 4-6 pages for short papers
(presenting very new and not so formalized work) or more than 8 pages
for long papers, (presenting completed work).


Paper Format Requirements

Paper should be formatted with the Lecture Notes in Computer Science
(LNCS) format, which can be found at Springer website
(http://www.springer.com/computer/lncs?SGWID=0-164-6-793341-0). The
submitted papers should be both in Word and in PDF format.


Paper Submission Process

All papers will be reviewed using a blind referring process by at
least two members of the program committee.
Submit a paper at http://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=nlpsl2010
(please use an EasyChair account before submitting and select the
appropriate workshop in the list when submitting. Also note that it is
mandatory to use this site to submit a paper: papers directly
submitted through e-mail won't be taken into account).


Publication

Accepted papers will be printed in Proceedings with an ISBN at the
MatrixRom Publishing House, which will be available at the workshop.


Committees

Organisational Committee

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

Stefan Trausan-Matu, chairman (UPB, Romania)
Philippe Dessus (University of Grenoble, France)
Wolfgang Greller (Open University, Netherlands)
Fridolin Wild (Open University, UK)
Christoph Mauerhofer (BIT Media e-Learning solution GMBH and CO KG,
Austria)


Program Committee
Gaston Burek (Tuebingen University, Germany)
Philippe Dessus (University of Grenoble, France)
Dale Gerdemann (Tuebingen University, Germany)
Wolfgang Greller (OUNL, The Netherlands)
Debra Hailey (Open University, UK)
George Kahrimanis (University of Patras, Greece)
Marco Kalz (OUNL, The Netherlands)
Benoît Lemaire (University of Grenoble, France)
Mathieu Loiseau (University of Grenoble, France)
Paola Monachesi (Utrecht University, The Netherlands)
Vlad Posea (UPB, Romania)
Traian Rebedea (UPB, Romania)
Stefan Trausan-Matu (UPB, Romania)
Dan Tufis (Romanian Academy Institute of Artificial Intelligence,
Romania)
Jan van Bruggen (OUNL, The Netherlands)
Fridolin Wild (Open University, UK)
Virginie Zampa (University of Grenoble, France)

Important Dates
Submission Deadline: Saturday 26th June 2010 11:59 pm CEST
Notification of acceptance: 15th July 2010
Camera-ready papers due date: 31st July 2010
NLPsL Workshop: 14th September, 2010


Registration

The registration for the workshop is free and it includes the
proceedings and coffee breaks.


Contact: Please ask any further question at stefan.trausan at cs.pub.ro

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