Supporting group awareness in web-based learning environments

In e-Learning systems, group awareness is an important issue. A tutor or a student needs to know the activities, knowledge, and contexts of others' in order to support learning processes effectively. In this paper, we present an awareness component model together with a notification mechanism designed to support group awareness within web-based learning environments. Furthermore, some of the key methods and techniques to implement the model will be presented. A prototype has been developed, which has been deployed within the e-Qualification Framework (e-QF) project. The objective of e-QF is to provide a platform, which supports the processing and provisioning of teaching material in the form of so-called Web-based trainings (WBTs). The platform can be accessed at the same time by tutors, authors, content providers, and students. In comparison to other approaches, which are aiming at supporting group awareness in web-based learning environments; our solution offers a higher degree of flexibility, tailor-ability, and reliability.