**1. Introduction**

14 Will-be-set-by-IN-TECH

136 E-Learning – Organizational Infrastructure and Tools for Specific Areas

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Discussion-based Internet forums or interactive chat rooms are an effective educational help system for both individuals and teams of learners. Many companies, particularly computer vendors (ComputerHope, 2004; IBM, 2004; Microsoft, 2004), adopt this technology to provide product training, learning or Q&A on their web sites. Nevertheless, the current state of chat forum technology only provides a platform for information exchange and organization (K.Kaye & J.Johnson, 2004). It is still unable to stimulate the users to learn from looking at the problem from different perspectives (Roberts & Ousey, 2003). The work reported in this chapter extends this technology further by incorporating critical thinking as a stimulus in teamwork discussions at algorithm one. We claim that such a method would sharpen web-based educational services. Separating the discussion topic from instant chat would further enhance the system into a comprehensive problem-based learning environment.

Problem-based learning (PBL) (Torp & Sage, 2002) and critical thinking (Fisher, 2001) skills have been used widely in education. These features are particularly noticeable in nursing education (Conway & Sharkey, 2002; Cooke & Moyle, 2002). This problem-based discipline can also apply to vocational education programs, such as, computer troubleshooting, which could be taught as a case study through Internet discussion. As we know, a trainee in a professional discipline, such as a computer technician, is more than just a passive learner but also an active problem-solver in real world situations. When a problem is encountered first in a learning process, it can be used as an initiative to build up learners' problem solving or reasoning skills. In the process, learners would appreciate this learning discussion and then embrace this added responsibility.

Essentially, there is a fundamental difference in the philosophy between nursing education and IT education (K.Kaye & J.Johnson, 2004; Lewis, Davies, Jenkins, & Tait, 2001). The difference in value between a life vs. a machine is such that discussion is not needed. A nursing-problem learning is very conservative in its approach; they often faced with poorly defined problems, incomplete information and etc. But a computer can be reloaded or reformated without any problems. It means we can redo the troubleshooting on a machine again without any major loss. Therefore one of our system design philosophies is to grant

Proposing Two Algorithms to Acquire Learning

Discussion

Fig. 1. The design model.

from the judgments of others.

Ramamurthy, 2004) to important issues.

higher scores than others.

to help solve the problems.

**2.2 The assessment model of MALESAassessment2**

discussions on them.

demand.

 2

Knowledge in Problem-Based Learning Environment 139

1. The first stage redesigns chat room and forum by adding the critical thinking function (Cooke & Moyle, 2002). This stage stimulates the learners to think about alternative

contributing personal problem-solution suggestions for the feedback of preference

Learners need to pay attention and think about why certain issues accumulate

The highly-scored issues are highlighted by the system to stimulate more

Those extensively discussed issues therefore end up with more meaningful content

 An indicator will show in the learning tool to help the educator and learners perceive what percentage of the discussion-problems has resulted in consensus;

 How many discussion-problems with consensus results enable the educator and learners to understand the progress of the discussion and the learning issues on

The second algorithm is called MALESAassessment. The principle of the system design is to reuse learners' discussion knowledge, which retained in MALESAbrain learning system, for answering the follow-up performance test. In this chapter the assessment system consults the learners for organizing their own problem-solving plan for answering their test

3. The third stage is to help learners and educator understand the current "learning-rate" (Culvenor, 2003). It indicates how many problems have consensus solutions, and how many problems are without consensus. The without consensus issues will become the

learning issues that the learners still need to further investigate or research.

also how many discussion-problems did not result in consensus.

The acronym for "Machine-Learning-Expert-System Algorithm for learning assessment"

2. The second stage is to help learners to pay "attention" (S. Paul, Haseman, &

aspects of the problem. They need to judge others' posted solutions by giving personal preference or judgment on solutions posted by others;

interest

knowledge

(2) Attention

(Thresholds)

belief

(3) Learning-rate

(Consensus)

(1) Critical Thinking (Forum & Chat Room Discussion)

more control to the system, by using statistics for decision-making. Thus the learning system becomes more intelligent and reduces the workload of educator. On the other hand, we relegate some of the problem-based learning principles into the development of the on-line intelligent learning tool.

Internet forums allow users to post their topics/learning-issues for discussion. In a well facilitated web site, after having chosen a topic, users can post their suggestions or switch to chat room for on-line discussion. Our system is designed to accept a broader view of problems within the learning domain and deeper discussion. This means that we can allow different problem-descriptions to be posted from individual learners within the set up learning domain. We are not confined to single problem and may achieve superior understanding of the problem in the discussions.

This chapter introduces two algorithms/models to design the MALESA learning system – one is MALESAbrain for learning discussion and another is MALESAassessment for learning assessment. The former is a discussion system in facilitating a PBL classroom. It encourages learners to judge or criticize the solutions posted by others before exploring further knowledge-content. The system then sums up the judgment scores as its knowledgeweight in order to pass the thresholds set up for ranking/arranging the learning issues. The latter MALESAassessment is an assessment system for evaluating learners' performances after learning discussion. It uses a real world practical problem to assess the learners' solving-plan and fixing-processes as the educator's marking standard. These two systems co-operate to transform chat forum technologies for the problem-based learning in IT education.
