Self-Tutoring, Teaching and Testing: An Intelligent Process Analyzer

Mastery of basic concepts and logical units is a prerequisite for solving complex problems. The divide-and-conquer strategy has been used successfully in a variety of problem solving situations, including algorithm design and software engineering. In this paper, we adopt a similar approach and propose a process analyzer in education. The goal is to help students improve their problem solving skills, as well as to assist teachers to monitor student response so that guidance can be provided as required. Complex and tedious processes are often encountered in curricula such as physics, chemistry, and mathematics, where the final answer is built upon the results of numerous smaller processes. Therefore the process analyzer defines the top-level process as a hierarchy composed of smaller integral parts so that students who are not able to solve the problem on their own are able to look at lower-level simpler processes and follow the hints leading to the correct answer. Question designers can define hints, as well as the score in each step. Responses are recorded for modeling student performance. The students interact with the Process Analyzer through a graphical interface, which provides an engaging and motivating environment. The positive feedback on our process analyzer shows the feasibility of our approach. We describe the design and implementation of the process analyzer, and present our future plan.