A Virtual Cooperative Learning Environment

Using Human Companion

Tahar Bouhadada and Mohamed Tayeb Laskri

Research Group on Artificial Intelligence, University of Annaba, Algeria

Abstract: This paper describes the architecture of an Interactive Learning Environment (ILE) on the internet using companions which one is a human and geographically distant of the learning site. The achieved system rests on a three-tier customer/server architecture (customer, web server, data and applications server) where human and software actors can communicate via the internet and uses the DTL learning strategy. It contains five main actors: a tutor actor in charge to guide the learner; a system actor whose role is to manage and to control the accesses to the system; a teacher actor in charge of the management and the updating of the different bases; a learner actor who represents the main actor of the system for whom is dedicated the teaching. Also, a learning companion actor whose role can be sometimes as an assistant, and other times as a troublemaker.   

Keywords: Interactive learning environment, LCS, DTL strategy, companion, distant learning, troublemaker. 

Received July 20, 2004; accepted September 26, 2004