Evaluating the quality of automatically generated question items has been a long standing challenge. In this paper, we leverage LLMs to simulate student profiles and generate responses to multiple-choice questions (MCQs). The generative students' responses to MCQs can further support question item evaluation. We propose Generative Students, a prompt architecture designed based on the KLI framework. A generative student profile is a function of the list of knowledge components the student has mastered, has confusion about or has no evidence of knowledge of. We instantiate the Generative Students concept on the subject domain of heuristic evaluation. We created 45 generative students using GPT-4 and had them respond to 20 MCQs. We found that the generative students produced logical and believable responses that were aligned with their profiles. We then compared the generative students' responses to real students' responses on the same set of MCQs and found a high correlation. Moreover, there was considerable overlap in the difficult questions identified by generative students and real students. A subsequent case study demonstrated that an instructor could improve question quality bas
Purpose: The teacher role in the classroom can explain important aspects of the student's school experience. The teacher-student relationship, a central dimension of social capital, influences students' engagement, and the teaching style plays an important role in student outcomes. But there is scarce literature that links teaching styles to teacher-student relationship. This article aims to: 1) analyze whether there is a relationship between teaching styles and the type of relationship perceived by students; 2) test whether this relationship is equally strong for any teaching style; and 3) determine the extent to which students' perceptions vary according to their profile. Design/methodology/approach: A structural equation model with four latent variables is estimated: two for the teacher-student relationship (emotional vs. educational) and two for the teaching styles (directive vs. participative), with information for 21126 sixth-grade primary-students in 2019 in Spain. Findings: Teacher-student relationships and teaching styles are interconnected. The participative style implies a better relationship. The perceptions of the teacher are heterogeneous, depending on gender (girls p
Teacher-student interaction (TSI) is essential for learning efficiency and harmonious teacher-student interpersonal relationships. However, studies on TSI support tools often focus on teacher needs while neglecting student needs and autonomy. To enhance both lecturer competence in delivering interpersonal interaction and student autonomy in TSI, we developed NaMemo2, a novel augmented-reality system that allows students to express their willingness to TSI and displays student information to teachers during lectures. The design and evaluation process follows a new framework, STUDIER, which can facilitate the development of theory-based ethnics-aware TSI support tools in general. The quantitative results of our four-week field study with four classes in a university suggested that NaMemo2 can improve 1) TSI in the classroom from both teacher and student perspectives, 2) student attitudes and willingness to TSI, and 3) student attitudes to the deployment of NaMemo2. The qualitative feedback from students and teachers indicated that improving TSI may be responsible for improved attention in students and a better classroom atmosphere during lectures.
Student modeling is central to many educational technologies as it enables predicting future learning outcomes and designing targeted instructional strategies. However, open-ended learning domains pose challenges for accurately modeling students due to the diverse behaviors and a large space of possible misconceptions. To approach these challenges, we explore the application of large language models (LLMs) for in-context student modeling in open-ended learning domains. More concretely, given a particular student's attempt on a reference task as observation, the objective is to synthesize the student's attempt on a target task. We introduce a novel framework, LLM for Student Synthesis (LLM-SS), that leverages LLMs for synthesizing a student's behavior. Our framework can be combined with different LLMs; moreover, we fine-tune LLMs to boost their student modeling capabilities. We instantiate several methods based on LLM-SS framework and evaluate them using an existing benchmark, StudentSyn, for student attempt synthesis in a visual programming domain. Experimental results show that our methods perform significantly better than the baseline method NeurSS provided in the StudentSyn benc
Data mining is known to have a potential for predicting user performance. However, there are few studies that explore its potential for predicting student behavior in a procedural training environment. This paper presents a collective student model, which is built from past student logs. These logs are firstly grouped into clusters. Then an extended automaton is created for each cluster based on the sequences of events found in the cluster logs. The main objective of this model is to predict the actions of new students for improving the tutoring feedback provided by an intelligent tutoring system. The proposed model has been validated using student logs collected in a 3D virtual laboratory for teaching biotechnology. As a result of this validation, we concluded that the model can provide reasonably good predictions and can support tutoring feedback that is better adapted to each student type.
Large language models (LLMs) can empower teachers to build pedagogical conversational agents (PCAs) customized for their students. As students have different prior knowledge and motivation levels, teachers must review the adaptivity of their PCAs to diverse students. Existing chatbot reviewing methods (e.g., direct chat and benchmarks) are either manually intensive for multiple iterations or limited to testing only single-turn interactions. We present TeachTune, where teachers can create simulated students and review PCAs by observing automated chats between PCAs and simulated students. Our technical pipeline instructs an LLM-based student to simulate prescribed knowledge levels and traits, helping teachers explore diverse conversation patterns. Our pipeline could produce simulated students whose behaviors correlate highly to their input knowledge and motivation levels within 5% and 10% accuracy gaps. Thirty science teachers designed PCAs in a between-subjects study, and using TeachTune resulted in a lower task load and higher student profile coverage over a baseline.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, online lectures have spread rapidly and many students are satisfied with them. However, one challenge remains the loss of concentration due to the lack of students' copresence. Our previous work suggests that presenting 3D characters with appropriate actions has the potential to improve concentration in online lectures. Nevertheless, an effective combination of actions has not yet been identified. In this study, we developed a lecture watching system that presents a 3D virtual classroom using a naked-eye 3D display. The system includes student characters that show copresence with various actions such as nodding, notetaking, and sleeping. An evaluation experiment was conducted with two conditions; (1) student characters perform only positive actions and (2) both positive and negative actions. The results, analyzed using posture and notetaking behavior as key indicators, suggest that the system can help to maintain concentration when the student characters perform both positive and negative actions, rather than only positive ones. These findings provide promising strategies for maintaining student focus in on-demand lectures and contribute to the developm
Asynchronous video learning, including massive open online courses (MOOCs), offers flexibility but often lacks students' affective engagement. This study examines how teachers' verbal and nonverbal vocal emotive expressions influence students' self-reported affective engagement. Using computational acoustic and sentiment analysis, valence and arousal scores were extracted from teachers' verbal vocal expressions, and nonverbal vocal emotions were classified into six categories: anger, fear, happiness, neutral, sadness, and surprise. Data from 210 video lectures across four MOOC platforms and feedback from 738 students collected after class were analyzed. Results revealed that teachers' verbal emotive expressions, even with positive valence and high arousal, did not significantly impact engagement. Conversely, vocal expressions with positive valence and high arousal, such as happiness and surprise, enhanced engagement, while negative high-arousal emotions, such as anger, reduced it. These findings offer practical insights for instructional video creators, teachers, and influencers to foster emotional engagement in asynchronous video learning.
One hallmark of expertise in physics is the ability to translate between different representations of knowledge and use the representations that make the problem-solving process easier. In quantum mechanics, students learn about several ways to represent quantum states, e.g., as state vectors in Dirac notation and as wavefunctions in position and momentum representation. Many advanced students in upper-level undergraduate and graduate quantum mechanics courses have difficulty translating state vectors in Dirac notation to wavefunctions in the position or momentum representation and vice versa. They also struggle when translating the wavefunction between the position and momentum representations. The research presented here describes the difficulties that students have with these issues and how research was used as a guide in the development, validation, and evaluation of a Quantum Interactive Learning Tutorial (QuILT) to help students develop a functional understanding of these concepts. The QuILT strives to help students with different representations of quantum states as state vectors in Dirac notation and as wavefunctions in position and momentum representation and with translat
It is clear, from the major press coverage that Virtual Reality (VR) development is garnering, that there is a huge amount of development interest in VR across multiple industries, including video streaming, gaming and simulated learning. Even though PC, web, and mobile are still the top platforms for software development, it is important for university computer science (CS) programs to expose students to VR as a development platform. Additionally, it is important for CS students to learn how to learn about new technologies, since change is constant in the CS field. CS curriculum changes happen much slower than the pace of technology adoption. As new technologies are introduced, CS faculty and students often learn together, especially in smaller CS programs. This paper describes how student-led VR projects are used, across the CS curriculum, as basic CS concepts are covered. The student-led VR projects are engaging, and promote learning and creativity. Additionally, each student project inspires more students to try their hand at VR development as well.
Not everyone who enrolls in college will leave with a certificate or degree, but the number of people who drop out or take a break is much higher than experts previously believed. In December 2013, there were 29 million people with some college education but no degree. That number jumped to 36 million by December of 2018, according to a new report from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center[1]. It is imperative to understand the underlying factors contributing to student withdrawal and to assist decision-makers to identify effective strategies to prevent it. By analyzing the characteristics and educational pathways of the stopout student population, our aim is to provide actionable insights that can benefit institutions facing similar challenges. Eastern Michigan University (EMU) faces significant challenges in student retention, with approximately 55% of its undergraduate students not completing their degrees within six years. As an institution committed to student success, EMU conducted a comprehensive study of student withdrawals to understand the influencing factors. And the paper revealed a high correlation between certain factors and withdrawals, even in the early
Imitation learning with a privileged teacher has proven effective for learning complex control behaviors from high-dimensional inputs, such as images. In this framework, a teacher is trained with privileged task information, while a student tries to predict the actions of the teacher with more limited observations, e.g., in a robot navigation task, the teacher might have access to distances to nearby obstacles, while the student only receives visual observations of the scene. However, privileged imitation learning faces a key challenge: the student might be unable to imitate the teacher's behavior due to partial observability. This problem arises because the teacher is trained without considering if the student is capable of imitating the learned behavior. To address this teacher-student asymmetry, we propose a framework for joint training of the teacher and student policies, encouraging the teacher to learn behaviors that can be imitated by the student despite the latters' limited access to information and its partial observability. Based on the performance bound in imitation learning, we add (i) the approximated action difference between teacher and student as a penalty term to t
Educational e-book platforms provide valuable information to teachers and researchers through two main sources: reading activity data and reading content data. While reading activity data is commonly used to analyze learning strategies and predict low-performing students, reading content data is often overlooked in these analyses. To address this gap, this study proposes LECTOR (Lecture slides and Topic Relationships), a model that summarizes information from reading content in a format that can be easily integrated with reading activity data. Our first experiment compared LECTOR to representative Natural Language Processing (NLP) models in extracting key information from 2,255 lecture slides, showing an average improvement of 5% in F1-score. These results were further validated through a human evaluation involving 28 students, which showed an average improvement of 21% in F1-score over a model predominantly used in current educational tools. Our second experiment compared reading preferences extracted by LECTOR with traditional reading activity data in predicting low-performing students using 600,712 logs from 218 students. The results showed a tendency to improve the predictive p
The analysis of log data generated by online educational systems is an important task for improving the systems, and furthering our knowledge of how students learn. This paper uses previously unseen log data from Edulab, the largest provider of digital learning for mathematics in Denmark, to analyse the sessions of its users, where 1.08 million student sessions are extracted from a subset of their data. We propose to model students as a distribution of different underlying student behaviours, where the sequence of actions from each session belongs to an underlying student behaviour. We model student behaviour as Markov chains, such that a student is modelled as a distribution of Markov chains, which are estimated using a modified k-means clustering algorithm. The resulting Markov chains are readily interpretable, and in a qualitative analysis around 125,000 student sessions are identified as exhibiting unproductive student behaviour. Based on our results this student representation is promising, especially for educational systems offering many different learning usages, and offers an alternative to common approaches like modelling student behaviour as a single Markov chain often do
This scoping review examines the use of student explanation strategies in postsecondary mathematics and statistics education. We analyzed 46 peer-reviewed articles published between 2014 and 2024, categorizing student explanations into three main types: self-explanation, peer explanation and explanation to fictitious others. The review synthesizes the theoretical underpinnings of these strategies, drawing on the retrieval practice hypothesis, generative learning hypothesis, and social presence hypothesis. Our findings indicate that while self-explanation and explaining to fictitious others foster individual cognitive processes enhancing generative thinking, peer explanation have the potential to combine these benefits with collaborative learning. However, explanation to fictitious others have the potential to mitigate some of the negative impacts that may occur in peer explanation, such as more knowledgeable students dominating peer discussions. The efficacy of the methods varies based on implementation, duration, and context. This scoping review contributes to the growing body of literature on generative learning strategies in postsecondary education and provides insights for opti
This study proposes a temporal modeling framework with a counterfactual policy-simulation layer for student dropout in higher education, using LMS engagement data and administrative withdrawal records. Dropout is operationalized as a time-to-event outcome at the enrollment level; weekly risk is modeled in discrete time via penalized, class-balanced logistic regression over person--period rows. Under a late-event temporal holdout, the model attains row-level AUCs of 0.8350 (train) and 0.8405 (test), with aggregate calibration acceptable but sparsely supported in the highest-risk bins. Ablation analyses indicate performance is sensitive to feature set composition, underscoring the role of temporal engagement signals. A scenario-indexed policy layer produces survival contrasts $ΔS(T)$ under an explicit trigger/schedule contract: positive contrasts are confined to the shock branch ($T_{\rm policy}=18$: 0.0102, 0.0260, 0.0819), while the mechanism-aware branch is negative ($ΔS_{\rm mech}(18)=-0.0078$, $ΔS_{\rm mech}(38)=-0.0134$). A subgroup analysis by gender quantifies scenario-induced survival gaps via bootstrap; contrasts are directionally stable but small. Results are not causally
We propose a novel knowledge distillation framework for effectively teaching a sensorimotor student agent to drive from the supervision of a privileged teacher agent. Current distillation for sensorimotor agents methods tend to result in suboptimal learned driving behavior by the student, which we hypothesize is due to inherent differences between the input, modeling capacity, and optimization processes of the two agents. We develop a novel distillation scheme that can address these limitations and close the gap between the sensorimotor agent and its privileged teacher. Our key insight is to design a student which learns to align their input features with the teacher's privileged Bird's Eye View (BEV) space. The student then can benefit from direct supervision by the teacher over the internal representation learning. To scaffold the difficult sensorimotor learning task, the student model is optimized via a student-paced coaching mechanism with various auxiliary supervision. We further propose a high-capacity imitation learned privileged agent that surpasses prior privileged agents in CARLA and ensures the student learns safe driving behavior. Our proposed sensorimotor agent results
Simplified categorizations have often led to college students being labeled as full-time or part-time students. However, at many universities student enrollment patterns can be much more complicated, as it is not uncommon for students to alternate between full-time and part-time enrollment each semester based on finances, scheduling, or family needs. While prior research has established full-time students maintain better outcomes then their part-time counterparts, limited study has examined the impact of enrollment patterns or strategies on academic outcomes. In this paper, we applying a Hidden Markov Model to identify and cluster students' enrollment strategies into three different categorizes: full-time, part-time, and mixed-enrollment strategies. Based the enrollment strategies we investigate and compare the academic performance outcomes of each group, taking into account differences between first-time-in-college students and transfer students. Analysis of data collected from the University of Central Florida from 2008 to 2017 indicates that first-time-in-college students that apply a mixed enrollment strategy are closer in performance to full-time students, as compared to part-
Learning often involves interaction between multiple agents. Human teacher-student settings best illustrate how interactions result in efficient knowledge passing where the teacher constructs a curriculum based on their students' abilities. Prior work in machine teaching studies how the teacher should construct optimal teaching datasets assuming the teacher knows everything about the student. However, in the real world, the teacher doesn't have complete information about the student. The teacher must interact and diagnose the student, before teaching. Our work proposes a simple diagnosis algorithm which uses Gaussian processes for inferring student-related information, before constructing a teaching dataset. We apply this to two settings. One is where the student learns from scratch and the teacher must figure out the student's learning algorithm parameters, eg. the regularization parameters in ridge regression or support vector machines. Two is where the student has partially explored the environment and the teacher must figure out the important areas the student has not explored; we study this in the offline reinforcement learning setting where the teacher must provide demonstrat
Knowledge Distillation, as a model compression technique, has received great attention. The knowledge of a well-performed teacher is distilled to a student with a small architecture. The architecture of the small student is often chosen to be similar to their teacher's, with fewer layers or fewer channels, or both. However, even with the same number of FLOPs or parameters, the students with different architecture can achieve different generalization ability. The configuration of a student architecture requires intensive network architecture engineering. In this work, instead of designing a good student architecture manually, we propose to search for the optimal student automatically. Based on L1-norm optimization, a subgraph from the teacher network topology graph is selected as a student, the goal of which is to minimize the KL-divergence between student's and teacher's outputs. We verify the proposal on CIFAR10 and CIFAR100 datasets. The empirical experiments show that the learned student architecture achieves better performance than ones specified manually. We also visualize and understand the architecture of the found student.