The purpose of this dissertation was to examine whether nontraditional student age, female gender, and the possession of nontraditional student risk factors predict enrollment in distance education college courses. This dissertation used data from the most recent National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS:12), which consisted of approximately 95,000 undergraduate students who were enrolled in higher education in 2011-2012. The results of a logistic regression analysis indicated that both nontraditional student age and female gender were strong predictors of enrollment in distance education, whereas the number of nontraditional student risk indicators was a partial predictor. As leaders in higher education are tasked with decreasing time to degree completion, it is hoped that the findings of this research will support distance education as one solution to this problem. Further exploration through the deconstruction of the nontraditional student risk index as defined by the National Center of Educational Statistics as well as examination of other factors such as ethnicity and GPA are needed to provide a more complete analysis of predictors of distance education enrollment as well as better data collection for distance education retention and success.

The dissertation describes the experiences of senior secondary students taking an online course for the first time to further their language education. The experiences are presented from the perspective of students, of supervising teachers and the 'virtual' teacher. Issues of importance with younger learners are identified and discussed and guidelines for the conduct of online courses at school level developed. It is proposed that online courses may have a worthwhile place in school education if specific learning needs can be met using this medium.

Online learning has grown exponentially within higher education in the past decade, especially at community colleges. As online course offerings expand community colleges need to assess student learning in order to ensure quality learning experiences for students and for accreditation purposes. The purpose of this study was to compare the assessment methods of community college faculty who teach the same course in both face-to-face and online formats, in order to determine the similarities and differences that exist in assessment practices. This study stemmed from the constructionist and pragmatic perspectives of the researcher. Additionally this study asked how community college faculty perceive the effectiveness of different assessment methods on student learning. The method for this research was a qualitative multiple case study in which community college accounting faculty were interviewed to explore how they assess student learning in both the online and face-to-face formats. Homework problems, exams, quizzes were the most commonly used methods of assessment of student learning in both formats by the study participants. Furthermore, exams and quizzes were believed to be most effective in assessing student learning, among the community college faculty members interviewed. Another discovery from this study included the prevalent use of publisher's software,called My Accounting Lab, among community college accounting faculty in administering assessments to students. Additional concerns around assessing online students effectively, managing online student group work, and mitigating online student cheating were also revealed during interviews with study participants. / Graduation date: 2013

This doctoral thesis provides a comprehensive treatise of contemporary modern methods of education including e-learning. In its preface the author presents its content, purpose, basis and objectives and sets the main goal of the thesis, namely an intention to analyse and evaluate the latest trends in e-learning, modern forms of education and use of information technology in organisation of studies. Sub-objectives of this dissertation relate to the structure of its prime objective and correspond with its individual chapters in which it presents the history of e-learning within the history of science and institutional education, evaluates the position of e-learning and other modern forms of education in the scope of political and legislative priorities of the European Union and of the Czech Republic and presents several core strategic and legislative documents covering this area also in connection with the concept of lifelong learning. The key theoretical part of the thesis contains a detailed overview of main theoretical issues related to e-learning and other modern forms of education in contemporary local and international literature. This part describes e-learning as a part of the concept of lifelong learning, provides basic definitions of e-learning as well as an analysis of related terms,...

Submitted by Luciana Ferreira (lucgeral@gmail.com) on 2016-06-01T10:57:51Z No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Matheus Rudolfo Diedrich Ullmann - 2016.pdf: 1264745 bytes, checksum: 65f8378224bd7fd700216a920f2da7a0 (MD5) license_rdf: 23148 bytes, checksum: 9da0b6dfac957114c6a7714714b86306 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Luciana Ferreira (lucgeral@gmail.com) on 2016-06-01T11:00:53Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Matheus Rudolfo Diedrich Ullmann - 2016.pdf: 1264745 bytes, checksum: 65f8378224bd7fd700216a920f2da7a0 (MD5) license_rdf: 23148 bytes, checksum: 9da0b6dfac957114c6a7714714b86306 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-06-01T11:00:53Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Matheus Rudolfo Diedrich Ullmann - 2016.pdf: 1264745 bytes, checksum: 65f8378224bd7fd700216a920f2da7a0 (MD5) license_rdf: 23148 bytes, checksum: 9da0b6dfac957114c6a7714714b86306 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-02-26 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / The MassiveOpenOnlineCourses(MOOCs)areonlinecourseswithopenenrollment that involvingahugeamountofstudentsfromdifferentlocations,withdifferentback- grounds andinterests.Thelargenumberofstudentsimpliesahugeandunmanageable number ofinteractions.Thisfact,alongwiththedifferentinterestsofstudents,resulting in low-qualityinteractions.Duetothelargenumberofstudents,alsobecomesunviable composition manuallylearninggroups.DuetothesecharacteristicspresentinMOOCs, a methodforforminggroupswasdevelopedinthiswork,asanattempttoattendthedi- chotomy existsbetweenthecollective,whichinvolvestheformationofanonlinelearning community onamassivescale,andindividual,withdifferentinterests,priorknowledge and expectationsanddifferentleadershipprofiles.Fortheformationofgroups,anadapta- tion ofParticleSwarmOptimizationalgorithmwasproposedbasedonthreecriteria,kno- wledge level,interestsandleadershipprofiles,formingthengroupswithdifferentlevels of knowledge,similarinterestsanddistributedleadership,providingbetterinteractionand knowledgeconstruction.Werecreatedtwovariationsoftheproblem,withfivestudents and theothersix.Basedoncomputationaltests,thealgorithmdemonstratedthatableto attend thegroupingcriteriainasatisfactorycomputingtimeandismoreefficientthanthe model randomgroupsformation.Thetestsalsodemonstratedthatthealgorithmisrobust taking intoaccountthevariousdatasetsanditerationsvariations.Toevaluatethequality of interactionsandknowledgebuildingingroupsformedbythemethod,Acasestudy wasconducted;andfortheanalysisofthecollecteddiscourses,itwastakenasthebasis twomodelsofdiscourseanalysisfoundintheliterature.Theresultsofthecasestudy demonstrated thatthegroupsformedbytheproposedmethodachievedthebestresultsin the interactionsandknowledgeconstruction,whencomparedwithgroupsthatdonotuse it. / Os Massive OpenOnlineCourses (MOOCs) sãocursos online com inscriçõesabertas que envolvemumaenormequantidadedeestudantesdediferenteslocalidades,comdife- rentes backgrounds e interesses.Ograndenúmerodealunosimplicaemumaenormee não gerenciávelquantidadedeinterações.Estefato,juntamentecomosinteressesdife- rentes dosalunos,resultaeminteraçõesdebaixaqualidade.Devidoàgrandequantidade de alunos,tambémtorna-seinviávelacomposiçãodegruposdeaprendizagemdeforma manual. DevidoàessascaracterísticaspresentesnosMOOCs,ummétodoparaformação de gruposfoidesenvolvidonestetrabalho,comoumatentativaparaatenderadicoto- mia queexisteentreocoletivo,queenvolveaformaçãodeumacomunidade online de aprendizagem emumaescalamaciça,eoindividual,comdiferentesinteresses,conhe- cimentos prévioseexpectativasecomdiferentesperfisdeliderança.Paraaformação dos grupos,umaadaptaçãodoalgoritmo ParticleSwarmOptimization foi propostacom base emtrêscritérios,níveldeconhecimento,interesseseperfisdeliderança,formando então gruposcomníveisdeconhecimentodiferentes,interessessemelhanteseliderança distribuída,proporcionandoumamelhorinteraçãoeconstruçãodeconhecimento.Foram criadas duasvariaçõesdoproblema,umacomcincoalunoseoutracomseis.Combase em testescomputacionais,oalgoritmodemonstrouqueconsegueatenderoscritériosde agrupamento emumtempodecomputaçãosatisfatórioeémaiseficientequeomodelode formação degruposaleatório.Ostestesdemonstraramtambémqueoalgoritmoérobusto levandoemcontaosvariadosconjuntosdedadosevariaçõesdeiterações.Paraavaliara qualidade dasinteraçõeseaconstruçãodeconhecimentonosgruposformadospelomé- todo, umestudodecasofoirealizado;eparaaanálisedosdiscursoscoletados,tomou-se como basedoismodelosdeanálisedediscursopresentesnaliteratura.Oresultadodo estudo decasodemonstrouqueosgruposformadospelométodopropostoobtiveramos melhores resultadosnasinteraçõeseconstruçãodoconhecimento,quandocomparados com osgruposquenãooutilizaram.

Over the past decade, the explosive growth of the Internet has led to a surge of interest to understand and predict aggregate behavior of large number of people or agents, particularly when they are connected through an underlying network structure. Numerous Internet-based applications have emerged that are as diverse as getting micro-tasks executed through online labor markets (also known as crowd sourcing) to acquiring new skills through massively open online courses (also known as MOOCs). However, there has been a major inadequacy in existing studies with respect to evaluating the impact of strategic behavior of the agents participating in such networks, crowds, and classrooms. The primary focus of this doctoral work is to understand the equilibrium behaviour emerging from these real-world, strategic environments by blending ideas from the areas of game theory, graph theory, and optimization, to derive novel solutions to these new-age economic models. In particular, we investigate the following three research challenges: (1) How do strategic agents form connections with one another? Will it ever happen that strategically stable networks are social welfare maximizing as well? (2) How do we design mechanisms for eliciting truthful feedback about an object (perhaps a new product or service or person) from a crowd of strategic raters? What can we tell about these mechanisms when the raters are connected through a social network? (3) How do we incentivize better participation of instructors and students in online edu-cation forums? Can we recommend optimal strategies to students and instructors to get the best out of these forums?

[EN] This thesis work contributes to the field of the {Automatic Speech Recognition} (ASR). And particularly to the {Interactive Speech Transcription} and {Confidence Measures} (CM) for ASR. The main goals of this thesis work can be summarised as follows: 1. To design IST methods and tools to tackle the problem of improving automatically generated transcripts. 2. To assess the designed IST methods and tools on real-life tasks of transcription in large educational repositories of video lectures. 3. To improve the reliability of the IST by improving the underlying (CM). Abstracts: The {Automatic Speech Recognition} (ASR) is a crucial task in a broad range of important applications which could not accomplished by means of manual transcription. The ASR can provide cost-effective transcripts in scenarios of increasing social impact such as the {Massive Open Online Courses} (MOOC), for which the availability of accurate enough is crucial even if they are not flawless. The transcripts enable search-ability, summarisation, recommendation, translation; they make the contents accessible to non-native speakers and users with impairments, etc. The usefulness is such that students improve their academic performance when learning from subtitled video lectures even when transcript is not perfect. Unfortunately, the current ASR technology is still far from the necessary accuracy. The imperfect transcripts resulting from ASR can be manually supervised and corrected, but the effort can be even higher than manual transcription. For the purpose of alleviating this issue, a novel {Interactive Transcription of Speech} (IST) system is presented in this thesis. This IST succeeded in reducing the effort if a small quantity of errors can be allowed; and also in improving the underlying ASR models in a cost-effective way. In other to adequate the proposed framework into real-life MOOCs, another intelligent interaction methods involving limited user effort were investigated. And also, it was introduced a new method which benefit from the user interactions to improve automatically the unsupervised parts ({Constrained Search} for ASR). The conducted research was deployed into a web-based IST platform with which it was possible to produce a massive number of semi-supervised lectures from two different well-known repositories, videoLectures.net and poliMedia. Finally, the performance of the IST and ASR systems can be easily increased by improving the computation of the {Confidence Measure} (CM) of transcribed words. As so, two contributions were developed: a new particular {Logistic Regresion} (LR) model; and the speaker adaption of the CM for cases in which it is possible, such with MOOCs. / [ES] Este trabajo contribuye en el campo del {reconocimiento automático del habla} (RAH). Y en especial, en el de la {transcripción interactiva del habla} (TIH) y el de las {medidas de confianza} (MC) para RAH. Los objetivos principales son los siguientes: 1. Diseño de métodos y herramientas TIH para mejorar las transcripciones automáticas. 2. Evaluar los métodos y herramientas TIH empleando tareas de transcripción realistas extraídas de grandes repositorios de vídeos educacionales. 3. Mejorar la fiabilidad del TIH mediante la mejora de las MC. Resumen: El {reconocimiento automático del habla} (RAH) es una tarea crucial en una amplia gama de aplicaciones importantes que no podrían realizarse mediante transcripción manual. El RAH puede proporcionar transcripciones rentables en escenarios de creciente impacto social como el de los {cursos abiertos en linea masivos} (MOOC), para el que la disponibilidad de transcripciones es crucial, incluso cuando no son completamente perfectas. Las transcripciones permiten la automatización de procesos como buscar, resumir, recomendar, traducir; hacen que los contenidos sean más accesibles para hablantes no nativos y usuarios con discapacidades, etc. Incluso se ha comprobado que mejora el rendimiento de los estudiantes que aprenden de videos con subtítulos incluso cuando estos no son completamente perfectos. Desafortunadamente, la tecnología RAH actual aún está lejos de la precisión necesaria. Las transcripciones imperfectas resultantes del RAH pueden ser supervisadas y corregidas manualmente, pero el esfuerzo puede ser incluso superior al de la transcripción manual. Con el fin de aliviar este problema, esta tesis presenta un novedoso sistema de {transcripción interactiva del habla} (TIH). Este método TIH consigue reducir el esfuerzo de semi-supervisión siempre que sea aceptable una pequeña cantidad de errores; además mejora a la par los modelos RAH subyacentes. Con objeto de transportar el marco propuesto para MOOCs, también se investigaron otros métodos de interacción inteligentes que involucran esfuerzo limitado por parte del usuario. Además, se introdujo un nuevo método que aprovecha las interacciones para mejorar aún más las partes no supervisadas (ASR con {búsqueda restringida}). La investigación en TIH llevada a cabo se desplegó en una plataforma web con el que fue posible producir un número masivo de transcripciones de videos de dos conocidos repositorios, videoLectures.net y poliMedia. Por último, el rendimiento de la TIH y los sistemas de RAH se puede aumentar directamente mediante la mejora de la estimación de la {medida de confianza} (MC) de las palabras transcritas. Por este motivo se desarrollaron dos contribuciones: un nuevo modelo discriminativo {logístico} (LR); y la adaptación al locutor de la MC para los casos en que es posible, como por ejemplo en MOOCs. / [CA] Aquest treball hi contribueix al camp del {reconeixment automàtic de la parla} (RAP). I en especial, al de la {transcripció interactiva de la parla} i el de {mesures de confiança} (MC) per a RAP. Els objectius principals són els següents: 1. Dissenyar mètodes i eines per a TIP per tal de millorar les transcripcions automàtiques. 2. Avaluar els mètodes i eines TIP per a tasques de transcripció realistes extretes de grans repositoris de vídeos educacionals. 3. Millorar la fiabilitat del TIP, mitjançant la millora de les MC. Resum: El {reconeixment automàtic de la parla} (RAP) és una tasca crucial per una àmplia gamma d'aplicacions importants que no es poden dur a terme per mitjà de la transcripció manual. El RAP pot proporcionar transcripcions en escenaris de creixent impacte social com els {cursos online oberts massius} (MOOC). Les transcripcions permeten automatitzar tasques com ara cercar, resumir, recomanar, traduir; a més a més, fa accessibles els continguts als parlants no nadius i els usuaris amb discapacitat, etc. Fins i tot, pot millorar el rendiment acadèmic de estudiants que aprenen de xerrades amb subtítols, encara que aquests subtítols no siguen perfectes. Malauradament, la tecnologia RAP actual encara està lluny de la precisió necessària. Les transcripcions imperfectes resultants de RAP poden ser supervisades i corregides manualment, però aquest l'esforç pot acabar sent superior a la transcripció manual. Per tal de resoldre aquest problema, en aquest treball es presenta un sistema nou per a {transcripció interactiva de la parla} (TIP). Aquest sistema TIP va ser reeixit en la reducció de l'esforç per quan es pot permetre una certa quantitat d'errors; així com també en en la millora dels models RAP subjacents. Per tal d'adequar el marc proposat per a MOOCs, també es van investigar altres mètodes d'interacció intel·ligents amb esforç d''usuari limitat. A més a més, es va introduir un nou mètode que aprofita les interaccions per tal de millorar encara més les parts no supervisades (RAP amb {cerca restringida}). La investigació en TIP duta a terme es va desplegar en una plataforma web amb la qual va ser possible produir un nombre massiu de transcripcions semi-supervisades de xerrades de repositoris ben coneguts, videoLectures.net i poliMedia. Finalment, el rendiment de la TIP i els sistemes de RAP es pot augmentar directament mitjançant la millora de l'estimació de la {Confiança Mesura} (MC) de les paraules transcrites. Per tant, es van desenvolupar dues contribucions: un nou model discriminatiu logístic (LR); i l'adaptació al locutor de la MC per casos en que és possible, per exemple amb MOOCs. / Sánchez Cortina, I. (2016). Confidence Measures for Automatic and Interactive Speech Recognition [Tesis doctoral no publicada]. Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/61473

The use of online courses continues to increase despite the small amount of research that exists on the effectiveness of online educational environments. The little research that has been conducted has focused on evaluating factors taken into consideration during the adoption of online learning environments. One notable benefit often cited is the ability to incorporate multimedia such as video games. Although game researchers and developers are pushing for the use of video games for educational purposes, there is a lack of research on the effectiveness of serious video games. When paring the increasing use of online educational environments, the push to use serious video games, and the lack of research on the effectiveness of online learning environments and video games, there is a clear need for further investigation into the use of serious video games in an online format. Based on current literature, no other known study has conducted an analysis comparing a serious game-based and non-game based online course; making this a unique study. The purpose of this study was to compare student learning experiences and outcomes between a serious game-based and non-game based online American History course. The data sources were data provided from Florida Virtual School (FLVS) and student and teacher interviews. Random samples of 92 students were statistically analyzed. A group of 8 students and 4 teachers were interviewed. FLVS data provided were analyzed using an independent t-test and the Mann-Whitney test and the student and teacher interview were analyzed using thematic analysis. Results of an independent t-test revealed that there was a significant (p > .01) difference in the mean number of days necessary to complete the course (MGB = 145.80, SDGB = 50.64, MNGB = 112.63, SDNGB = 49.60). The Mann-Whitney results indicated a significant difference between course performance and the type of American history course (Z = -5.066, p > .01); students in the serious game-based online course had an A average whereas students in the non-game-based online course had a B average. The thematic analysis of the relationship between student performance and motivation in both courses indicated that students and teachers of the game-based online course provided more reasons for student motivation than the students and teachers in the non-game-based online course. The thematic analysis of what aspects do students perceive as helpful and/or hindering to their learning indicated that students and teachers of the game-based online course provided more desirable, more helpful, less undesirable, and less hindering aspects for their course than the students and teachers in the non-game-based online course. As a result of the unique nature of this study, the findings provide new information for the fields of research on online learning, serious video gaming, and instructional design as well as inform instructional-designers, teachers, education stakeholders, serious video game designers, and education researchers.