This thesis describes a formal model of a subtype of humour, and the implementation of that model in a program that generates jokes of that subtype. Although there is a great deal of literature on humour in general, very little formal work has been done on puns, and none has been implemented. All current linguistic theories of humour are over-general and not falsifiable. Our model, which is specific, formal, implemented and evaluated, makes a significant contribution to the field. Punning riddles are our chosen subtype of verbal humour, for several reasons. They are very common, they exhibit certain regular structures and mechanisms, and they have been studied previously by linguists. Our model is based on our extensive analysis of large numbers of punning riddles, taken from children's jokebooks. The implementation of the model, JA PE (Joke Analysis and Production Engine), generates punning riddles, from a humour independent lexicon. Pun generation requires much less world knowle...

. The paper discusses issues to be considered when evaluating an Intelligent Learning Environment. In particular it considers problems that may arise when using rigorous experimental methods and the usefulness of informal techniques. It advocates the frequent use of informal in-depth studies on prototypes during the development of a system to reveal problems with the ILE in use and to raise general issues applicable across ILEs. In particular it is claimed that student interaction with a novel ILE is very likely to include unexpected and unpredictable aspects that can only be revealed and thus accommodated by such studies. Introduction Whenever one describes work in Intelligent Learning Environments (ILEs) one can rightly expect to be asked how the work has been evaluated. Although there are many methods of evaluation available, implicit within such requests there is often an expectation of a rigorous, formal, experimental, controlled, summative evaluation (hereafter referred to as con...

. In this paper we describe the evaluation of a personalised information system for patients with cancer. Our system dynamically generates hypertext pages that explain treatments, diseases, measurements etc related to the patient's condition, using information in the patient's medical record as the basis for the tailoring. We describe results of a controlled trial comparing this system with a non-personalised one. The results of the trial show significant results concerning the patients' preferences for personalised information. We discuss the implications of our evaluation and results for the development and evaluation of future personalised systems, and adaptive hypertext systems in particular. Key words: Empirical evaluation, tailored explanations, healthcare, dynamic hypertext, information systems, language generation This paper has not been submitted elsewhere in identical or similar form, nor will it be during the first three months after its submission to UMUAI. 1. Introduction...

An empirical approach that makes use of neuro-fuzzy synergism to evaluate the students in the context of an intelligent tutoring system is presented. In this way, a qualitative model of the student is generated, which is able to evaluate information regarding student's knowledge and cognitive abilities in a domain area. The neuro-fuzzy model has been tested on a prototype tutoring system in the physics domain of the vertical projectory motions and the results have been very satisfactory.

This paper describes a formative evaluation of the advice generator of an intelligent learning environment for novice users of a GUI. 20 human tutors participated in this procedure. The human tutors had to answer theoretical questions about their way of generating advice. In addition, they were asked what they would advise learners, in real life examples, which were acquired by a previous empirical study. Their answers were compared to the responses generated by the learning environment. As a consequence, improvements were made to the system based on the evaluations’ conclusions. 1.

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Evaluation of intelligent tutoring systems (ITS) is an important area of research in current educational practices. There are many evaluation methods available but the literature does not suggest any clear guidelines for an evaluator – normally an educator – which methods to use in particular contexts. This paper proposes a classification of evaluation methods to simplify the selection task. The classification is based on two primary questions relating to the target of evaluation and learning environment in which the evaluation would be pursued. The classification is hoped to help in improving quality of computer based education by providing a practical and to the point way of selecting the appropriate evaluation methods for intelligent tutoring systems.

This paper describes a multimedia tutoring system for Algebra. The system is called "EasyMath" and it incorporates intelligence. One of the primary aims of EasyMath is its usefulness in school classrooms, therefore school teachers of mathematics have been involved throughout the life cycle of EasyMath. The design of EasyMath has been based on the results of an empirical study that was conducted at schools and the resulting product was evaluated by school-teachers as well as students. EasyMath incorporates techniques from Intelligent Tutoring Systems. In particular, it takes a reconstructive approach to student modelling and error diagnosis, which uses a generic model of the domain for the reconstruction of correct and incorrect solutions to exercises. EasyMath provides a facility for the dynamic construction of new exercises for students on which it can perform error diagnosis and provide appropriate advice. EasyMath has been evaluated by school teachers and students. The results of the evaluation show that the multimedia interface provides a user-friendly interactive environment which seems more attractive to students than conventional teaching methods. In addition, EasyMath's intelligence guarantees more individualised advice with high relevance to the context and problems of the students.

This paper describes the work involved in the development of an Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) for Algebraic powers. The system is called EasyMath. One of the primary aims of EasyMath is its usefulness to teachers and students in real school environments in common with other projects such as (Alexandris et al. 1998). The domain of Mathematics is particularly suitable for the development of ITSs since it is a domain where students often have difficulty in grasping correctly all the concepts and procedures needed to solve mathematical problems. In this respect, the student modelling component of an ITS can be particularly useful to the functionality of the whole system. Indeed there have been reports on the successful use of ITSs in Math classrooms (e.g. Koedinger and Anderson 1993). However, ITSs have often been criticized that they may miss the mark in terms of task reality, feasibility and effectiveness (McGraw 1994). A solution to this problem may be the involvement of school teachers in the development of an ITS. School teachers are highly experienced with real

... Web PVT), an adaptive web-based Intelligent Computer Assisted Language Learning (ICALL) program that is aimed at teaching non-native speakers the passive voice of the English language. The design of the system has been largely based on the results of an empirical study that was conducted at schools with the collaboration of human teachers. Web PVT incorporates techniques from Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS) and Adaptive Hypermedia (AH) technologies to provide students with individualised instruction and feedback. The system uses a combination of stereotypes and the overlay technique for the initialisation of the student model, which is then refined by observing the student while working with the system. The resulting student model is used for the annotation of the links to topics presented to the student. In addition, it is also used in the process of error diagnosis and the adaptation of feedback and advice provided to the student.