Dissemination of the results of the R&D&I project ‘SmartLearnUni’ to society in general. Researchers from GIR DATAHES, GIR ADMIRABLE and the JCYL UICs No. 348 and No. 170 have participated in the Science Week held at La Estación de la Ciencia y la Tecnología of the University of Burgos and presented the results of the R&D&I project ‘SmartLearnUni’ to society.
Teachers from Secondary Education, Adult Education and the School of Art of the Provincial Directorate of Education of Burgos, as well as teachers from the Departments of Computer Engineering and Health Sciences of the University of Burgos and students from the Health Sciences Programme of the UBU and the Doctoral Programme in Transdisciplinary Research of the UVA, participated in a training activity on ‘Smart Technological Resources applied to learning in educational contexts’.
Specifically, two talks were held, the first one ‘Opportunities and challenges of using chatbots in virtual learning platforms in Higher Education’, was given by Dr Raúl Marticorena Sánchez, member of the GIR ADMIRABLE and researcher of the ‘SmartLearnUni’ project. The results of the research within this part of the project can be found in the following publications: · Ochoa-Orihuel, J., Marticorena-Sánchez, R., & Sáiz-Manzanares, M.C. (2020). Moodle LMS Integration with Amazon Alexa: A Practical Experience. Appl. Sci., 10, 6859. · Sáiz-Manzanares, M.C., Marticorena Sánchez, R., & Ochoa Orihuel, J. (2021). Using Advanced Learning Technologies with university students: an analysis with Machine Learning techniques. Electronics, 10(21), 2620.
· Sáiz-Manzanares, M.C., Marticorena-Sánchez, R., Martín-Antón, L.J., González-Diez, I., & Almeida, L. (2023). Perceived satisfaction of university students with the use of chatbots as a tool for self-regulated learning. Heliyon, 9(1) · Marticorena Sánchez, R., & Sáiz Manzanares, M. C. (2024). Protocolo para la integración de un chatbot en una plataforma virtual de aprendizaje tipo Moodle. Repositorio institucional de la UBU.
Dr Marticorena Sánchez highlighted the strengths of the use of chatbots for personalised attention to students. However, he also addressed the challenges that this technology entails and the difficulties that the project's researchers encountered in the development of the project. These relate to a certain reluctance related to data confidentiality on the part of students to use chatbots, and the lack of integration of this technology by academic institutions in an ordinary curricular interaction. As well as the continuous technological advances in this field, which have gone from question-answer conversational thread systems to Large Language Models (LLMs), which implies continuous technological updates. In a second talk - given by Dr María Consuelo Sáiz Manzanares, PI of the ‘SmartLearnUni’ project and director of GIR DATAHES and of the UIC of the JCYL No. 348 -, ‘the use of integrated multichannel eye tracking technology (Galvanic Skin Response -GSR- and Electroencephalogram -EEG-) applied to the field of education and health’ was addressed. In this part of the project, this technology has been implemented for the study of the learning process aimed at personalised educational response. The publications in which the results can be consulted are: · Sáiz-Manzanares, M.C., et al. (2021). Analysis of the learning process through eye tracking technology and feature selection techniques. Applied Sciences, 11, 6157, 1-24. · Sáiz-Manzanares, M.C., et al. (2021). Eye-tracking Technology and Data-mining Techniques used for a Behavioral Analysis of Adults engaged in Learning Processes. Journal of Visualized Experiments, e62103. · Sáiz-Manzanares, M.C., Marticorena-Sánchez, R., ... (2023). Using eye tracking technology to analyse cognitive load in multichannel activities in university students. International Journal of Human–Computer Interaction, 40(12), 3263-3281. · Sáiz-Manzanares, M.C., Marticorena-Sánchez, R., ... (2023). Application and challenges of eye tracking technology in Higher Education. Comunicar, 76, 1-12. · Sáiz-Manzanares, M.C., Marticorena-Sánchez, R., ... (2024). Using integrated multimodal technology: a way to personalised learning in Health Sciences and Biomedical engineering Students. Applied Sciences, 14(16), 7017.
· Sáiz-Manzanares, M. C., Marticorena-Sánchez, R., Sáez-García, J., & González-Díez, I. (2024). Analysing Virtual Labs Through Integrated Multi-Channel Eye-Tracking Technology: A Proposal for an Explanatory Fit Model. Applied Sciences, 14(21), 9831.
· Sáez-García, J., Sáiz-Manzanares, M. C., & Marticorena-Sánchez, R. (2024). Challenges in data processing analysis by monitoring the learning process with Eye Tracking and Galvanic Skin Response. Computers, 13(11), 289
In summary, the results highlight the importance of self-regulated work in the learning space, and students' prior knowledge as indicators related to effective learning. The use of integrated multi-channel eye tracking technology has facilitated the detailed analysis of the learning process. The different static and dynamic metrics make it possible to study the use of cognitive and metacognitive strategies during the resolution of different types of tasks (verbal, auditory, written, mixed, etc.) and to obtain patterns of execution. In addition, this technology provides the recording of numerous metrics and their processing and analysis requires the use of supervised and unsupervised Machine Learning techniques. All this has facilitated the personalised adjustment of tasks and learning materials to the characteristics and needs of each student, promoting full inclusion. Dr Sáiz Manzanares also addressed the challenges of using this technology, which are related to its cost, the individuality of its application, the huge amount of data it generates and the need to automate its processing so that this technology can be used regularly in the educational and health context.
A practical workshop was also held in which the participants in the activity were able to get to know and use the integrated multichannel eye tracking technology and visualise the results. All of them concluded that its regular use in the classroom would facilitate the knowledge of the learning process of each student and would guide a precise educational response, as well as personalised attention, which would improve the educational inclusion of all students, especially those with educational needs.