CONSTRUCTIVIST LANGUAGE LEARNING TOOL

Abstract

The topic of this paper is a constructivism-oriented foreign language learning tool currently in the development at the CIITLAB laboratory of the University of Niš, Faculty of Electronic Engineering. This tool is a follow-up to the existing DSi e-learning framework, developed at the same laboratory which expands its feature set in the direction of constructivism. One of its primary aims is foreign language learning, and it is expected to be positioned as a component in larger e-learning environments, though it is able to operate in a stand-alone fashion. The tool is in the prototype phase and it is being tested against several use cases. The core concept of the tool is coupling the ubiquitous drag and drop user interface with the semantic structure of the textual instructional documents. By dragging and dropping, the learner interacts with the tool and affects the document semantics. The approach is learner-centered and enables the learner to take the active role in learning.