A Smart Learning Environment for a Blended Experience

Abstract

Online learning witnessed a shift in the attention of educators and e-learning specialists from transfer of knowledge-to-knowledge building and management, seeking to enhance innovative approaches while redefining better processes of learning. This is the case with this smart virtual learning environment (VLE), called Scholar. The authors have taken full advantage of new e-learning affordances to pedagogically design and develop it based on a reflexive ideology whereby complex reasoning skills such as critical and creative thinking form part of the process. Additionally, computer science collaborators employed available learning analytics and data mining techniques to automate critical thinking assessment through topic modelling, as well as semantically analyzing text to assess peer reviews. The purpose of this chapter is to report on the work done to extend both these lines of research and to document results from an empirical study in the form of in-class experiences in an attempt to address student needs in the next stage of online learning.