Finding the optimal topic sequence of online courses requires experts with lots of knowledge about taught topics. Having a good order is necessary for a good learning experience. By using educational recommender systems across different platforms we have the problem that the connection to an ontology sometimes does not exist. Thus, the state of…

Providing consistent, individualized feedback to teachers is essential for improving instruction but can be prohibitively resource intensive in most educational contexts. We develop an automated tool based on natural language processing to give teachers feedback on their uptake of student contributions, a high-leverage teaching practice that…

Computer-graders have been in regular use in the context of MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses). The automatic grading of programs presents an opportunity to assess and provide tailored feedback to large classes, while featuring at the same time a number of benefits like: immediate feedback, unlimited submissions, as well as low cost of feedback.…

Overall the social capital of MOOCs is under-exploited. For most students in MOOCs, autonomous learning often means learning alone. Students interested in adding a social dimension to their learning can browse discussion threads, join social medias and may message other students but usually in a blind and somehow random way, only hoping to find…

Promises of "teacher-light" tuition and of enhanced "efficiency" via the automation of teaching have been with us since the early days of digital education, sometimes embraced by academics and institutions, and sometimes resisted as a set of moves which are damaging to teacher professionalism and to the humanistic values of…