A Generic AI-Based Technique for Assessing Student Performance in Conducting Online Virtual and Remote Controlled Laboratories

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the development of educational technology, e-learning has become essential in the educational process. However, the adoption of e-learning in sectors such as engineering, science, and technology faces a particular challenge as it needs a special Laboratory Learning M...

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Main Authors: Ahmed M. Abd El-Haleem, Mohab Mohammed Eid, Mahmoud M. Elmesalawy, Hadeer A. Hassan Hosny
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: IEEE 2022-01-01
Series:IEEE Access
Subjects:
Online Access:https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9973300/
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author Ahmed M. Abd El-Haleem
Mohab Mohammed Eid
Mahmoud M. Elmesalawy
Hadeer A. Hassan Hosny
author_facet Ahmed M. Abd El-Haleem
Mohab Mohammed Eid
Mahmoud M. Elmesalawy
Hadeer A. Hassan Hosny
author_sort Ahmed M. Abd El-Haleem
collection DOAJ
description Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the development of educational technology, e-learning has become essential in the educational process. However, the adoption of e-learning in sectors such as engineering, science, and technology faces a particular challenge as it needs a special Laboratory Learning Management System (LLMS) capable of supporting online lab activities through virtual and controlled remote labs. One of the most challenging tasks in designing such LLMS is how to assess a student’s performance while an experiment is being conducted and how stuttering students can be automatically detected while experimenting and providing the appropriate assistance. For this, a generic technique based on Artificial Intelligence (AI) is proposed in this paper for assessing student performance while conducting online labs and implemented as a performance evaluation module in the LLMS. The performance evaluation module is designed to automatically detect the student performance during the experiment run time and triggers the LLMS virtual assistant service to provide struggling students with the appropriate help when they need it. Also, the proposed performance assessment technique is used during the lab exam sessions to support the automatic grading process conducted by the LLMS Auto-Grading Module. The proposed performance evaluation technique has been developed based on analyzing the student’s mouse dynamics to work generally with any type of simulation or control software used by virtual or remote controlled laboratories; without the need for special interfacing. The study has been applied to a novel dataset built by the course instructors and students simulating a circuit on TinkerCad. Using mouse dynamics fetching, the system extracts features and evaluates them to determine if the student has built the experiment steps in the right way or not. A comparison study has been developed between different Machine Learning (ML) models and a number of performance metrics are calculated. The study confirmed that Artificial Neural Network (ANN) and Support Vector Machine (SVM) are the best models to be used for automatically evaluating student performance while conducting the online labs with a precision reaching up to 91%.
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spelling doaj-art-9f433c91d0d047ceaee025b80f4ded9d2025-01-18T00:00:12ZengIEEEIEEE Access2169-35362022-01-011012804612806510.1109/ACCESS.2022.32275059973300A Generic AI-Based Technique for Assessing Student Performance in Conducting Online Virtual and Remote Controlled LaboratoriesAhmed M. Abd El-Haleem0https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6969-5627Mohab Mohammed Eid1Mahmoud M. Elmesalawy2Hadeer A. Hassan Hosny3https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6217-8950Electronics and Communications Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Helwan University, Cairo, EgyptSchool of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Nile University, Giza, EgyptElectronics and Communications Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Helwan University, Cairo, EgyptComputer and Systems Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Helwan University, Cairo, EgyptDue to the COVID-19 pandemic and the development of educational technology, e-learning has become essential in the educational process. However, the adoption of e-learning in sectors such as engineering, science, and technology faces a particular challenge as it needs a special Laboratory Learning Management System (LLMS) capable of supporting online lab activities through virtual and controlled remote labs. One of the most challenging tasks in designing such LLMS is how to assess a student’s performance while an experiment is being conducted and how stuttering students can be automatically detected while experimenting and providing the appropriate assistance. For this, a generic technique based on Artificial Intelligence (AI) is proposed in this paper for assessing student performance while conducting online labs and implemented as a performance evaluation module in the LLMS. The performance evaluation module is designed to automatically detect the student performance during the experiment run time and triggers the LLMS virtual assistant service to provide struggling students with the appropriate help when they need it. Also, the proposed performance assessment technique is used during the lab exam sessions to support the automatic grading process conducted by the LLMS Auto-Grading Module. The proposed performance evaluation technique has been developed based on analyzing the student’s mouse dynamics to work generally with any type of simulation or control software used by virtual or remote controlled laboratories; without the need for special interfacing. The study has been applied to a novel dataset built by the course instructors and students simulating a circuit on TinkerCad. Using mouse dynamics fetching, the system extracts features and evaluates them to determine if the student has built the experiment steps in the right way or not. A comparison study has been developed between different Machine Learning (ML) models and a number of performance metrics are calculated. The study confirmed that Artificial Neural Network (ANN) and Support Vector Machine (SVM) are the best models to be used for automatically evaluating student performance while conducting the online labs with a precision reaching up to 91%.https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9973300/Artificial intelligencemouse dynamicslaboratory learning management systemvirtual assistantartificial neural network (ANN)support vector machine (SVM)
spellingShingle Ahmed M. Abd El-Haleem
Mohab Mohammed Eid
Mahmoud M. Elmesalawy
Hadeer A. Hassan Hosny
A Generic AI-Based Technique for Assessing Student Performance in Conducting Online Virtual and Remote Controlled Laboratories
IEEE Access
Artificial intelligence
mouse dynamics
laboratory learning management system
virtual assistant
artificial neural network (ANN)
support vector machine (SVM)
title A Generic AI-Based Technique for Assessing Student Performance in Conducting Online Virtual and Remote Controlled Laboratories
title_full A Generic AI-Based Technique for Assessing Student Performance in Conducting Online Virtual and Remote Controlled Laboratories
title_fullStr A Generic AI-Based Technique for Assessing Student Performance in Conducting Online Virtual and Remote Controlled Laboratories
title_full_unstemmed A Generic AI-Based Technique for Assessing Student Performance in Conducting Online Virtual and Remote Controlled Laboratories
title_short A Generic AI-Based Technique for Assessing Student Performance in Conducting Online Virtual and Remote Controlled Laboratories
title_sort generic ai based technique for assessing student performance in conducting online virtual and remote controlled laboratories
topic Artificial intelligence
mouse dynamics
laboratory learning management system
virtual assistant
artificial neural network (ANN)
support vector machine (SVM)
url https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9973300/
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