L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB eLearning and Semantic Web Rudi Studer Christoph Schmitz, Steffen Staab, Gerd Stumme, Julien Tane Learning Lab Lower Saxony Institute AIFB, University of Karlsruhe AIFB

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Overview Motivation Semantic Web: Ontologies and Metadata Ontology-based eLearning Conclusion

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Motivation eLearning aims at replacing time place content predetermined learning with a task-relevant personalized just-in-time active process of learning How do we achieve these objectives?

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Metadata eLearning Standards Approach: Provide descriptions of learning resources Enable search and query Enable configuration of learning components Goal: To promote and facilitate the discovery, retrieval, and composition of relevant eLearning materials

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Current Metadata Standards for eLearning IEEE LOM (Learning Object Meta-data) ARIADNE – Alliance of Remote Instructional, Authoring and Distribution Networks for Europe IMS – Instructional Management System Global Learning Consortium

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Characteristics of Current Approaches Engineering Electr. Engineering Integrated Digital Circuit Engineering Electr. Engineering Integrated Digital Circuit Chip CMOS Challenges : – Name Conflicts – Structure Conflicts – Limited Semantics

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Limitations of current Web-based solutions search and query is restricted to keyword-based methods contents of course components is captured only partially lack of flexible customization to user needs lack of flexible configuration of course components

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Overview Motivation Semantic Web: Ontologies and Metadata Ontology-based eLearning Conclusion

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Semantic Web The Semantic Web: a new form of Web content that is meaningful to computers will unleash a revolution of new possibilities (Tim Berners-Lee et al., Scientific American, 2001) Make content accessible and interpretable by machines Provide metadata that come with precisely defined semantics Provide shared vocabulary

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Meaning Triangle People [and machines] cant share knowledge if they dont speak a common language (Davenport) Symbol Thing stands for refers to evokes Concept jaguar

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Ontologies An ontology is an explicit specification of a conceptualization (Gruber 1993) Ontologies offer a conceptual foundation for communication between actors a formal basis to define a vocabulary a vocabulary that is shared among a group of actors Ontologies are used at run time, they are part of the eLearning application

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Ontologies and RDF/RDFSchema RDF/RDFSchema provide modelling primitives for lightweight ontologies classes and subClass hierarchies properties and subProperty hierarchies domain and range specifications for properties instances

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Ontologies & RDF(S) rdfs:Resourcerdfs:Classrdf:Property RDF/RDFS layer and namespace application specific schema and namespace appl:Documentappl:Protocolappl:Title application specific actual data RFC2068: Hypertext transfer Protocol appl:Title appl:content subClassOf instanceOf appl:Topicappl:Serviceappl:contentHTTP Protocol Subject Predicate Object

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Semantic Web & Ontologies More heavyweight ontologies all to capture more semantics of a domain prevDocument and nextDocument are inverse to each other subClassOf is transitive axioms yield additional knowledge: teaches (prof1, course2) and isAbout (course2, ontologies) knowsAbout (prof1, ontologies)

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Overview Motivation Semantic Web: Ontologies and Metadata Ontology-based eLearning Conclusion

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Semantic Web & eLearning The Semantic Web is a very suitable framework for realizing some aspects of eLearning systems Development steps: collaborative ontology development for eLearning ontology-based annotation of learning material integration of learning resources dynamic composition of course material Access: proactive delivery of the learning materials integrated browsing and query facilities

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Conventional Metadata for eLearning Engineering Electr. Engineering Integrated Digital Circuit Engineering Electr. Engineering Integrated Digital Circuit Chip CMOS Problems: Lack of formal semantics Different vocabularies for metadata Lack of semantic mapping Ontologies are suitable as a conceptual backbone Define shared understanding Provide semantic underpinning for metadata

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Ontology-based Metadata Metadata in eLearning are concerned with several orthogonal dimensions: What the learning material is about (content) What is the learning situation (context) How is the learning material connected to other learning materials (structure) Learning resource Content Context Structure

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Ontology-based Metadata Benefits in the process of providing and accessing information: Synonyms Agent and Actor Different languages Lecture (English) and Vorlesung (German) Morphological variations eLearning and e-Learning Semantic relationships Computer Science is a superTopicOf Database Systems Professor is related to Course via the teaches relation CS101 is an instanceOf Course

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Overview Motivation Semantic Web: Ontologies and Metadata Ontology-based eLearning Conclusion

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Conclusion Ontologies can support eLearning in three ways: for describing the semantic content of the learning materials, for defining the learning context and for describing the structure of the learning materials

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Conclusion This three-dimensional, semantically structured space enables semantic querying PADLR module Edutella Presentations by Christoph Schmitz and others semantic navigation PADLR module Courseware Watchdog Presentation by Julien Tane flexible combination and personalization of learning resources

L3S Open Day 4. Dezember 2002 © 2002 Rudi Studer, Institut AIFB Thank you! Learning Lab Lower Saxony Institute AIFB, University of Karlsruhe karlsruhe.de/WBS AIFB