Teaching Modelling Literacy: An Artificial Intelligence Approach

In Model-Driven Engineering (MDE), models are used to build and analyze complex systems. In the last decades, different modelling formalisms have been proposed for supporting software development. However, their adoption and practice strongly rely on mastering essential modelling skills to develop a complete and coherent model-based system. Moreover, it is often difficult for novice modellers to get direct and timely feedback and recommendations on their modelling strategies and decisions, particularly in large classroom settings which hinders their learning. Certainly, there is an opportunity to apply Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques to an MDE learning environment to empower the provisioning of automated and intelligent modelling advocacy. In this paper, we propose a framework called ModBud (a modelling buddy) to educate novice modellers about the art of abstraction. ModBud uses natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning (ML) to create modelling bots with the aim of improving the modelling skills of novice modellers and assisting other practitioners, too. These bots could be used to support teaching with automatic creation or grading of models and enhance learning beyond the traditional classroom-based MDE education with timely feedback and personalized tutoring. Research challenges for the proposed framework are discussed and a research roadmap is presented.