A Separation of Concerns Proposal for the Modeling of Collaborative Learning

A main concern on CSCL (computer supported collaborative learning) is the integration of the different collaboration modes, namely: synchronous and asynchronous, structured and unstructured or predefined and ad-hoc ways of communication, co-operation and coordination. Educational modeling languages (EMLs) have been proposed to enable the computational modeling of educational units, including also the variety of collaboration modes. Nevertheless, current EMLs have not achieved a comprehensive solution. This paper analyzes the requirements to support such modes and the capacity of the existing proposals. Then, a new EML proposal to satisfy the identified requirements is presented, PoEML: perspective-oriented educational modeling language. The main idea underlying the PoEML proposal is the separation of the concerns.