Towards a collaborative e-learning platform based on a multi-agents system

Abstract

Today, e-learning is one of the most popular teaching methods. One of its modes is the collaborative learning, where learners can collaborate with their peers, share ideas, and where everyone should be involved in the social interaction. However, the efficiency of collaborative learning depends on the motivation of its members to collaborate, their skills and the quality of tools used to encourage learners to participate actively to exchange knowledge. In this sense, the intelligent agent paradigm, which originates from the computational intelligence field, gained a tremendous interest in its application in collaborative e-learning. This research work focuses on the use of intelligent agents in the sphere of e-learning to encourage collaborative learning. Intelligent agents can be used to assist teachers and tutors by permitting them to track the progress of learners and accordingly recommend the best matching helpers for collaboration. The paper introduces a framework of collaborative e-learning environment based on a Multi-Agents System (MAS). The objective is to incorporate the intelligence of the Multi-Agent System to collect information about the learners' activities and help tutors to exploit these information to promote collaborative learning. Thus, the system integrates seven agents that interact and ensure the following features: 1/ facilitate the task of tutors by allowing them to appreciate learners' activities and track the progress of learners and their level of collaboration; 2/ avoid the isolation of learners and motivate them; and 3/ encourage collaborative working and the use of collaborative work tools.