The relevance of the research is due to the growing need to develop innovative methods of teaching vocabulary in the lessons of Russian as a foreign language (RCT). The purpose of the study is to develop and test a methodology for teaching vocabulary to a Chinese audience using the LearningApps multimedia platform. The object of the study the process of learning foreign language vocabulary. The subject of the study is the use of an interactive platform for learning foreign vocabulary. Scientific novelty A set of interactive exercises for effective vocabulary memorization has been developed and tested using the interactive LearningApps platform, which is integrated into Russian as a foreign language (RCT) class with Chinese first-year students. The theoretical significance of the study lies in the fact that the results of Russian and foreign studies on the use of modern information and communication technologies of online services in teaching foreign vocabulary to university students were summarized. The practical significance of the study lies in the fact that the results of experimental work and the developed set of exercises using the LearningApps multimedia platform can be used to teach Chinese students vocabulary within the framework of teaching Russian as a foreign language (RCT). / Актуальность исследования обусловлена нарастающей потребностью в разработке инновационных методов преподавания лексики на уроках русского как иностранного языка (РКИ). Цель исследования состоит в разработке и апробации методики преподавания лексики для китайской аудитории с использованием мультимедийной платформы LearningApps. Объект исследования: процесс обучения иноязычной лексике. Предмет исследования: применение интерактивной платформы для изучения иностранной лексики. Научная новизна Разработан и апробирован комплекс интерактивных упражнений для эффективного запоминания лексики с помощью интерактивной платформы LearningApps， который интегрируется в занятия РКИ с китайскими студентами первого курса. Теоретическая значимость исследования заключается в том, что были обобщены результаты российских и зарубежных исследований относительно применения современных информационно-коммуникационных технологий онлайн-сервисов в преподавании иностранной лексики студентам вуза. Практическая значимость исследования состоит в том, что результаты опытно-экспериментальной работы и разработанный комплекс упражнений с применением мультимедийной платформы LearningApps может быть использован для обучения китайских студентов лексике в рамках преподавания РКИ.

The purpose of this research is to explore students’ on-line interactivity in an Open Distance Learning institution with other students, educators, study materials and Unisa as the sampled prototypical research subject. A mixed-method of research encompassing both explorative and descriptive aspects was used. Data was collected through myUnisa discussion forum, focus group interviews and an on-line questionnaire from second and third year Health Services Management students at the University of South Africa (Unisa). Although the findings indicated that 84.9% of students owned computers, and 100% owned cellular phones, only 3.8% participated in the discussion forum. On-line discussion forum are critical in Open Distance Learning (ODL) because it allows people who cannot physically attend the educational institution to interact with each other. Almost 40% of these sampled students agreed that the discussion forum allowed them to study with their peers. However, only 53 of the 1,379 students registered for both second and third year studies during the first semester participated in the discussion forum. This indicates that very few students benefit from on-line interaction. Most of the students who are enrolled in Health Services Management course are from 21 to above 50 years of age. This age factor can have an impact on computer literacy. Some of them indicated that they struggled with the utilisation of technology. The majority of these students do not utilise the prescribed on-line interactive tools effectively. Students’ need support cognitively, academically, administratively, institutionally and affectively. The findings suggest that although students are aware of the benefits of using online technologies, they do not have the support from the institution to enable them to better their skills in using these technologies. The other challenge that they have raised is that educators also interact minimally on-line. Therefore, they do not receive the necessary feedback they require. The university systems are sometimes offline, which becomes worse during registration and submission of assignments. The recommendations emanating from the study warrants various interventions of multiple stakeholders to resolve the students’ challenges. / Health Studies / D.Litt, et Phil. (Health Studies)

Cette thèse en informatique se situe dans le domaine des Environnements Informatiques pour l’Apprentissage Humain (EIAH). Dans ce cadre, nous avons abordé la question de la personnalisation de l’apprentissage. Nos travaux de recherche consistaient à identifier un processus qui permette à la fois de personnaliser des séances de travail sur papier et des séances de travail sur des logiciels pédagogiques. Nous souhaitions que ce processus permette de prendre en compte les spécificités de chaque apprenant en s’appuyant sur son profil, mais qu’il prenne également en compte les buts et les habitudes pédagogiques des enseignants. Enfin, nous souhaitions que ce processus soit implémentable dans un système externe aux logiciels à personnaliser. Notre problématique s’est donc décomposée en trois points : comment exploiter les profils d’apprenants pour prendre en compte les individualités des apprenants ? Comment adapter une activité pour prendre en compte les besoins et habitudes pédagogiques d’un enseignant ? Et enfin, comment attribuer une activité à un apprenant ? Pour répondre au premier point, nous avons proposé le modèle cPMDL. Ce complément du langage de modélisation des profils PMDL permet de contraindre les profils des apprenants afin de sélectionner ceux ayant les caractéristiques requises par les contraintes. cPMDL nous permet donc d’exploiter les informations contenues dans les profils au sein du processus de personnalisation. Pour répondre au deuxième point, nous avons proposé l’approche GEPPETO. Cette approche s’appuie sur des modèles et des processus génériques permettant d’adapter les activités en fonction des intentions pédagogiques des enseignants grâce à la définition de contraintes sur les activités. Nous avons décliné cette approche pour permettre l’adaptation des activités papier (GEPPETOP), ainsi que pour l’adaptation des activités logicielles et de la configuration des environnements qui les supportent (GEPPETOS). Pour répondre au troisième point, nous avons proposé le modèle PERSUA2 qui permet de lier les contraintes sur profils de cPMDL aux contraintes sur activités de GEPPETO. Ces liens, nommés règles d’affectation, sont ensuite hiérarchisés selon leur degré de priorité pour former une stratégie pédagogique qui sera associée { un ou plusieurs contextes d’utilisation. Nous avons mis en oeuvre ces différentes contributions théoriques dans Adapte, un module de l’environnement informatique du projet PERLEA. Le rôle de cet environnement est d’assister l’enseignant dans la gestion de profils créés par l’enseignant lui-même ou issus de logiciels pédagogiques. Adapte est l’une des exploitations possibles des profils : le module réalisé permet de fournir à chaque apprenant des activités adaptées à son profil tout en respectant les choix pédagogiques de son enseignant. Ces activités peuvent être des activités papier proposées par le système ou des activités logicielles personnalisées par Adapte, mais effectuées dans un autre EIAH. Ce module, pleinement opérationnel, a montré la faisabilité technique de nos contributions théoriques et nous a permis de conduire des mises à l'essai auprès d'enseignants / This thesis in computer science belongs to the field of Interactive Learning Environments (ILE). In this context, we have addressed the issue of personalization of learning. Our research has consisted in identifying a process allowing one to personalize both paper working sessions and working sessions on educational software. Our goal was to design a process able to take into account the specificities of each learner, based on their profiles, but also to take into account the pedagogical goals and habits of teachers. Moreover, we had to design this process such as it could be easily implemented in a software external to the system being personalized. Our problem was therefore decomposed into three points: how to use learners’ profiles to take the individuality of learners into account? How to adapt a pedagogical activity to take the teaching needs and habits of a teacher into account? And finally, how to assign an activity to a learner? To answer the first point, we have proposed the cPMDL model. This complement of the profiles modelling language PMDL allows one to constrain the learners’ profiles to select those with the characteristics required by the constraints. cPMDL allows us to exploit the information contained in the profiles during the personalization process. To answer the second point, we have proposed the GEPPETO approach. This approach relies on generic models and processes to adapt activities according to the teachers' intentions, by defining constraints on activities. We have instantiated this approach to enable on the one hand the adaptation of paper activities (GEPPETOP) and on the other hand to enable the adaptation of software activities and the adaptation of configuration of environments that support them (GEPPETOS). To address the third point, we have proposed the PERSUA2 model which links cPMDL constraints on profiles with GEPPETO constraints on activities. Next, these links, called assignment rules, are organized into a hierarchy according to their priority degree in order to form a pedagogical strategy. This pedagogical strategy is then associated with one or more contexts of use. We have implemented these different theoretical contributions in Adapte, a module of the environment associated to the PERLEA project. The role of this environment is to assist teachers in the management of profiles created by themselves or coming from pedagogical software. Adapte is one of the possible uses of profiles: the module developed provides each learner with activities suited to their profiles, while respecting the teaching choices of the teacher. These activities may be paper activities proposed by the system or software activities personalized by Adapte but made within another ILE. This module, fully operational, has demonstrated the technical feasibility of our theoretical contributions and has allowed us to conduct experiment with teachers.

This thesis reports a collective case study of the school educational experiences of five severely and profoundly deaf students who were enrolled in regular schools in rural areas of New South Wales. The students ranged in age from 6 to 18 years. Three issues were examined: (1) The impact of the philosophy of inclusive education and the question of why students with high degrees of deafness and high support needs were enrolled in regular schools in rural areas; (2) The specific linguistic an educational support needs of deaf students; and (3) The ability of the regular schools and teachers to cater for the educational needs of the deaf students in those settings. The case studies revealed that to considerably varying extents in different situations, the students were afforded inclusive educational opportunities. The extent of inclusiveness of students’ educational experiences was shown to vary according to a number of variables. The variables identified included: the type and quality of communication with the deaf student, teaching style, accessibility of content, particular lesson type, and the type and extent of curriculum adaptations employed. As a result of the analysis of the data from the five cases, a number of generalistions were possible. These generalisations were that (a) students with the ability to access spoken communication auditorily were more easily included than students using manual communication; (b) reduction of linguistic and academic input occurred as a response to student inability to access class programs because of reduced linguistic capabilities, resulting in the deaf students receiving different and reduced information to the hearing students; (c) communication between a deaf student and his or her class teacher needed to be direct for the most successful inclusion to occur; (d) teaching style needed to be interactive or experiential for successful language learning and literacy development to occur; (e) curriculum adaptations needed to involve provision of visual support for lesson material to be highly effective; (f) lessons/subjects easily supported by visual means, such as mathematics or practical subjects, when taught hierarchically, going from the known to unknown in achievable steps, meant teaching style could be either transmission or interactive, for lesson activities to be considered inclusive; (g) students with poor literacy skills were unable to successfully access an intact (i.e., unaltered and complete) high school curriculum; (h) the teaching style of the class teacher impacted on the support model possible for the itinerant teacher; (i) an interactive class teaching style allowed for cooperative teaching between class teacher and itinerant teacher who could then assist the class teacher with both the linguistic and academic needs of the deaf student; (j) a transmission style of teaching resulted in various levels of withdrawal for the deaf student unless the subject matter could be represented visually; (k) when curriculum content or expected outcomes were reduced, the deaf students did not have the same access to information as their hearing counterparts and consequently could not develop concepts or understandings in the same manner; and (l) language and literacy development were most facilitated when interactive teaching opportunities were established proactively for the deaf students rather than through the reduction of content as a response to their failure to successfully engage with the complete curriculum. The conclusions suggest an alternative support proposal for deaf students in rural environments. The model of support proposed involves the targeting of specific preschools and primary schools with the provision of teachers identified to teach collaboratively and interactively. Under the proposed model several students with impaired hearing would be located within the one school with the itinerant teacher position becoming a full-time appointment in that school. Such a model would enable coenrolment, co-teaching, co-programming, creative grouping, and the provision of demonstration opportunities and support for other teachers within the school and district that had deaf students enrolled. Finally, interactive teaching, based on a clearly defined theoretical model of language acquisition, development, and learning, is recommended for students with impaired hearing in such environments. It is argued that the support of linguistic development and academic learning could be facilitated concurrently, thus ensuring that by the time students had reached high school they would possess sufficient literacy skills to access a regular high school program successfully. / PhD Doctorate

Skrivande och skrivet språk är idag en viktig del av många människors liv, i datorns ordbehandlare, i e-postprogram och i chattkanaler på Internet. Skrivet språk har blivit mer eller mindre en förutsättning för människors dagliga kommunikation. Denna utveckling av samhället leder till ökade behov av att på olika sätt hantera text. En teknologi som har stor potential att hjälpa människor med skrivande och skrivet språk är språkteknologi. I denna avhandling ligger fokus på olika språkverktyg vars avsikt är att stödja skribenter och de som lär sig svenska bland annat genom att skriva. Ett språkverktyg som har utvecklats och utvärderats i avhandlingen är språkgranskningsverktyget Granska. I arbetet med Granska har fokus legat på utvecklingen av regelspråk, granskningsregler och generella analysregler samt utvärdering av dessa. Granska kombinerar en statistisk grundanalys av ordens ordklasser med regelbaserade metoder för sökning av grammatiska fel och frasanalys. I utvecklingen av granskningsreglerna är dragkampen mellan felaktiga utpekningar av fel, så kallade falska alarm, och uteblivna utpekningar av fel, det största enskilda problemet. Dragkampen uppstår genom att det är svårt att hitta många fel utan att också göra en del felaktiga utpekningar. Språkverktyg för skrivande kan i stort sett utvärderas på två sätt: med fokus på texten eller på den som skriver. I denna avhandling har båda typerna av utvärdering utförts med såväl modersmålskribenter som skribenter med svenska som andraspråk. I en första textbaserad utvärdering visade det sig att textgenre spelar stor roll för Granskas resultat. Ett vanligt fel i en textgenre förekommer nästan inte alls i en annan. Detta innebär att det blir mycket svårt för programmet att inte avge några falska alarm i de texter där feltypen saknas. I en andra textbaserad utvärdering jämfördes Granska och en kommersiell grammatikkontroll på texter från andraspråksskribenter. Den kommersiella grammatikkontrollen visade sig att ha bättre träffsäkerhet, men upptäckte färre fel än Granska. En första mindre användarstudie utfördes med Granska och fem erfarna skribenter. Syfte med studien var att utveckla Granska i linje med skribenters behov vid revision av text. Resultatet indikerade att användarna inte hade några problem med att välja mellan olika feldiagnoser om ett av ersättningsförslagen var korrekt. Falska alarm verkade vara av varierande svårighetsgrad: falska alarm från stavningskontrollen är mer eller mindre ofarliga, medan falska alarm från granskningen av mer komplicerade feltyper kan försvåra revisionsarbetet för användaren. Granska utvecklades från början för erfarna skribenter med svenska som modersmål, men allteftersom arbetet har fortskridit har även skribenter med svenska som andraspråk blivit en allt viktigare användargrupp. I detta arbete har diskussionen om granskningsmetod blivit mer och mer central. Även om gruppen andraspråksskribenter är mycket heterogen, så innehåller den här gruppens texter generellt sett mer fel, och i många fall fler fel i samma mening. Detta gör granskningsproblemet betydligt svårare. För det första så blir det svårare att avgöra ordens ordklass och frastillhörighet när flera fel finns i samma mening, och därmed har programmet allt mindre att hänga upp den grundläggande språkliga analysen på. För det andra är det svårare att konstruera granskningsregler för fel vars natur är svår att förutsäga på förhand. För att förbättra den grundläggande språkanalysen utvecklades programmet GTA, som gör en frasanalys och satsgränsigenkänning. GTA utvecklades ur de generella analysregler som redan fanns i Granska. GTA designades för att klara av att analysera texter som innehåller vissa avvikelser från språkets norm, t.ex. inkongruens. För att ta reda på hur väl programmet klarade av mindre avvikelser i form av stavfel utvärderades GTA och även två program för ordklassanalys på texter med olika andel stavfel. GTA bygger till mycket stor del på att identifikationen av ordklass fungerar för att fraser och satsgränser skall analyseras korrekt. Detta bekräftas också i utvärderingen, där det visade sig att GTA klarar sig bra så länge som den underliggande ordklassanalysen klarar att hantera avvikelser i texten. En viktig faktor för att klara språkliga avvikelser, i form av stavfel, är en fungerande metod för att hantera ord som är okända för programmet. Nya metoder för språkgranskning har undersökts i samarbete med andra forskare, och där har avhandlingens bidrag varit i form av transformationsregler i den statistiska språkgranskaren ProbGranska. Dessa regler visade sig vid en utvärdering avsevärt förbättra ProbGranskas säkerhet när det gällde att identifiera grammatiska problem. I utvecklingen av språkgranskaren SnålGranska har avhandlingen bidragit med idéer till dess grundläggande algoritm. Denna algoritm bygger på att träna ett maskininlärningsprogram på konstgjorda fel i avsaknad av en korpus med många uppmärkta autentiska fel. För att komma vidare med utvecklingen av språkverktyg för andraspråksskribenter genomfördes en längre fältstudie vid ett svenskt universitet. Syftet var att studera användningen av Granska i autentiska skrivuppgifter som studenterna genomförde i en avancerad kurs i svenska som främmande språk. Sexton studenter med olika språklig och kulturell bakgrund deltog i studien. En viktig del av studien utgjordes av studenternas bedömningar av Granskas alarm. Bedömningarna gjordes på en betygsskala från 1 till 5. Studenternas texter samlades också in i två versioner; en version före och en efter användningen av programmet. Denna metod gjorde det möjligt att studera i vilken grad studenterna följde Granskas råd, och huruvida dåliga eller bra råd från programmet fick höga eller låga betyg. Mest alarmerande var att dåliga råd angående ordföljd alltid fick högsta betyg. Andra ofta lämpliga råd dömdes ut för att beskrivningen av dessa feltyper, t.ex. anmärkningar om saknade tempusböjda verb och uteblivna subjekt, var svåra att förstå samt att de saknade ersättningsförslag. En viktig insikt från fältstudien var att Granska eller liknade verktyg inte är det enda verktyg som andraspråksskribenter behöver när de skriver text. Denna insikt tillsammans med andra resultat från fältstudien mynnade ut i flera designprinciper för program med fokus på andraspråksskribenter. Dessa designprinciper användes sedan i utformningen av språkmiljön Grim. Grim är en ordbehandlingsmiljö med olika interaktiva språkverktyg integrerade: Granska, GTA, den statistiska språkgranskaren ProbGranska, lexikonet Lexin med åtta olika språkpar, konkordansgränssnitt mot stora textmängder från korpusen Parole, och en ordböjningsfunktion. I Grim kan användaren arbeta med egna eller andras texter, och få återkoppling på språkets former från Granska och GTA, undersöka ords användning i autentiska texter samt få en ökad förståelse av målspråket genom integrerade tvåspråkiga lexikon. / Writing and written language play today an increasingly important part in many people’s lives. Written language has become more or less a prerequisite for daily communication. This development of society leads to increased needs for tools that can help humans in dealing with text. A technology that has a potential to aid people with writing and written language is language technology. In this thesis, the focus is on language tools based on language technology that can aid writers and learners of Swedish. A language tool that has been developed and evaluated in the thesis is the grammar checker Granska. The thesis work on Granska includes the design of its rule language, and the development of grammar checking rules for common error types in Swedish. In addition, rules for phrase analysis and clause boundary detection have been developed constituting a partial and shallow parser called GTA. Language tools for writing can mainly be evaluated in two ways: with focus on text or with focus on the writer. In this thesis, both types of evaluations have been carried out both with native writers and second language writers. The first textual evaluation of Granska showed that the genre has a strong influence on the result. In a second evaluation, Granska was compared with a commercial grammar checker on second language writers’ texts. Granska found more errors, but with a lower precision. A third evaluation focused on the general text analyzers, which Granska relies on, in this case a statistical word class analyzer and the parser GTA. These programs were evaluated on texts where spelling errors were introduced, in order to test the programs’ robustness. Results showed that as long as the word class analyzer is robust the parser GTA would also be robust. In a first formative user study with Granska and five participants, results suggested that several and competing error diagnoses and correction proposals are not a problem for the users as long as there exist at least one accurate correction proposal. Moreover, false alarms from the spelling checker seemed to pose a limited problem for the users, but false alarms on more complicated error types might disturb the revision process of the users. In order to improve the design of language tools for second language writers a field study was carried out at a Swedish university. Sixteen students with different linguistic and cultural backgrounds participated in the study. The objective was to study the use of Granska in students’ free writing. The results indicated that although most alarms from Granska are accurate, lack of feedback and misleading feedback are problems for second language writers. The results also suggested that providing the students with feedback on different aspects of their interlanguage, not only errors, and facilitating the processes of language exploration and reflection are important processes to be supported in second-language learning environments. These insights were used as design principles in the design and development of an interactive language environment called Grim. This program includes a basic word processor, in which the user can get feedback on linguistic code features from different language tools such as Granska and GTA. In addition, other tools are available for the user to explore language use in authentic texts and to achieve lexical comprehension through bilingual dictionaries. / QC 20100428

The purpose of this research is to explore students’ on-line interactivity in an Open Distance Learning institution with other students, educators, study materials and Unisa as the sampled prototypical research subject. A mixed-method of research encompassing both explorative and descriptive aspects was used. Data was collected through myUnisa discussion forum, focus group interviews and an on-line questionnaire from second and third year Health Services Management students at the University of South Africa (Unisa). Although the findings indicated that 84.9% of students owned computers, and 100% owned cellular phones, only 3.8% participated in the discussion forum. On-line discussion forum are critical in Open Distance Learning (ODL) because it allows people who cannot physically attend the educational institution to interact with each other. Almost 40% of these sampled students agreed that the discussion forum allowed them to study with their peers. However, only 53 of the 1,379 students registered for both second and third year studies during the first semester participated in the discussion forum. This indicates that very few students benefit from on-line interaction. Most of the students who are enrolled in Health Services Management course are from 21 to above 50 years of age. This age factor can have an impact on computer literacy. Some of them indicated that they struggled with the utilisation of technology. The majority of these students do not utilise the prescribed on-line interactive tools effectively. Students’ need support cognitively, academically, administratively, institutionally and affectively. The findings suggest that although students are aware of the benefits of using online technologies, they do not have the support from the institution to enable them to better their skills in using these technologies. The other challenge that they have raised is that educators also interact minimally on-line. Therefore, they do not receive the necessary feedback they require. The university systems are sometimes offline, which becomes worse during registration and submission of assignments. The recommendations emanating from the study warrants various interventions of multiple stakeholders to resolve the students’ challenges. / Health Studies / D.Litt. et Phil. (Health Studies)