Authoring Effective Embedded Tutors: An Overview of the Extensible Problem Specific Tutor (xPST) System
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Computer Science—the theory, representation, processing, communication and use of information—is fundamentally transforming every aspect of human endeavor. The Department of Computer Science at Iowa State University advances computational and information sciences through; 1. educational and research programs within and beyond the university; 2. active engagement to help define national and international research, and 3. educational agendas, and sustained commitment to graduating leaders for academia, industry and government.
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The Computer Science Department was officially established in 1969, with Robert Stewart serving as the founding Department Chair. Faculty were composed of joint appointments with Mathematics, Statistics, and Electrical Engineering. In 1969, the building which now houses the Computer Science department, then simply called the Computer Science building, was completed. Later it was named Atanasoff Hall. Throughout the 1980s to present, the department expanded and developed its teaching and research agendas to cover many areas of computing.
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1969-present
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- College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (parent college)
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Abstract
The Extensible Problem Specific Tutor (xPST) allows authors who are not cognitive scientists and not programmers to quickly create an intelligent tutoring system that provides instruction akin to a model-tracing tutor. Furthermore, this instruction is overlaid on existing software, so that the learner’s interface does not have to be made from scratch. The xPST architecture allows for extending its capabilities by the addition of plug-ins that communicate with additional third-party software. After reviewing this general architecture, we describe three major implementations that we have created using the xPST system, each using different third-party software as the learner’s interface. We have conducted three evaluations of authors using xPST to create tutoring content, and these are considered in turn. These evaluations show that xPST authors can quickly learn the system, and can efficiently produce successful embedded instruction.
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This is a manuscript of an article published as Gilbert, Stephen B., Stephen B. Blessing, and Enruo Guo. "Authoring Effective Embedded Tutors: An Overview of the Extensible Problem Specific Tutor (xPST) System." International Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education 25, no. 3 (2015): 428-454. DOI:10.1007/s40593-015-0045-0. Posted with permission.