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Weekly UpdatesA student takes a test on the Web site. The Tutor and Testing Model automatically evaluates the answers, analyses them and sends the analysis results to the student, including correct and incorrect answers, grades and explanations on where to find more information about the question under consideration as well as explanations of the answers. One of the advantages is that information is provided to the student straight after he/she completes the self-control test. Therefore the system is valuable not only as an assessment tool, but also as learning mean.
A lecturer applying the system enters his/ her user name and password on the internet site. Questions can be generated by the system itself or can be selected by a lecturer. The system provides information on testing process in a matrix and graphical form:
* Information on correct and incorrect answer,
* Time distribution to every question,
* Number of times a student has changed an answer to each question of a test.
In the columns of the tables the number of a student is indicated, in the rows--the number of a question. The correct answers are marked from 0 to 1 (including 0,5 and other intermediate values), 1 means that the answer is correct, 0--incorrect. Similar tables are designed also for the time distribution (here the time for each answer is indicated in seconds) and for parameters of student doubts to select one or another answer (the number shows how many times the answer was changed to another one).
Also the complex parameters are presented, where not only the correctness of the answer is evaluated, but also the time required for student to answer as well as the doubts of selection. Evaluating the answer by a complex parameter, the knowledge assessment may even change.
From the information provided the general view on strong and week points of the module and its test properties may be generated and the suggestions for improvement derived.
The presented information also helps to determine the more difficult and the easier question. The difficulty is determined by complex parameters, it is continuously adjusted until it becomes reasonable and stable. In this way the intelligent testing system helps a student not to get lost in the information overload, providing individualized learning guidelines, ignoring too simple course material therefore decreasing cognitive load and providing more complicated course material for further improvement therefore not frustrating the student motivation.
The developed intelligent testing system also provides a lecturer with a statistical analysis of students' answers according their gender and type of studies--full-time or distance. Also it can show the distribution of answering results by gender.
The further trends of improving the system involve development of adaptive testing function in the testing system when the sufficient statistical data on question difficulty is available.
8. GRAPHIC INTERFACE
A modern intelligent tutoring system can implement its functions effectively only when users can have active dialogue with a computer by using means for dialogue organisation determining how the information is provided and how the information and commands are interchanged. Therefore, the system-user dialogue is important, as well as the interface (dialogue system) helping to have comfortable and effective dialogue. Without a suitable interface user cannot have full advantage of the system features. The user interface includes all mechanisms for data input and for output of results from the system. Various user interface types are used (commands, menu, graphic, etc.). This system has graphic interface: icons in windows opened in the computer screen show data, models and other objects available in the system. By graphic interface a user can control data, knowledge and subsystems and to review the results in the computer screen or to have them printed.
9. CONCLUSIONS
Analysis of the worldwide intelligent tutoring systems has shown that there are no systems developed for the field of real estate management. Despite that, high development and maintenance costs, lack of components reuse and standards usually leads to investigation of just research idea while the rest of a system is left just as infrastructure of components for only supporting research. There is no general tutoring construction environment. The authors have developed the intelligent tutoring system, from the beginning to the end, having all the interrelated components and introducing some new. The system is designed for tutoring real estate management.
The Intelligent Life Long Learning Tutoring System for Real Estate Management developed by authors consists of six subsystems: Domain Model, Student Model, Tutor and Testing Model, Database of Computer Learning Systems, Decision Support Subsystem, Graphic Interface.
Domain model includes knowledge with the supplemental audio and video material for 63 modules being taught in Vilnius Gediminas Technical University. Student model enables to adapt to a learner needs and knowledge level. Decision support subsystem is used for all components of intelligent tutoring system giving them different level of intelligence. Database of computer learning systems enables using the following web-based learning systems: construction, real estate, facilities management, international trade, ethics, innovation, sustainable development, building refurbishment, etc. Tutor and testing model provide a model of the teaching process and support transition to a new knowledge state. The model allows assessment of knowledge not only by the correct/incorrect answer, but also takes into account the time taken for a student to answer a question and the doubts appeared, the complex parameters, etc. The developed system provides support to the student by presenting explanations of the answers and the links to certain literature. It provides statistical analysis on knowledge acquirement depending on the gender of the student and the type of studies the student is involved in - distance or full-time. For the teacher the system is also useful because it helps to evaluate the correctness of a question formulation, difficulty of a question and directions for refinement of a test or a model, etc. Graphic interface is used to create an effective system-user dialogue.
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