Vidya Network Educational Tool

Abstract

This article presents the computational architecture of the Vidya Network, a multilingual and multi-tenant educational tool designed to manage semantic networks of concept maps. Such networks can support conceptual learning from an interdisciplinary and socio-interactionist perspective, establishing significant relationships between main concepts and other concepts related to the working domain. Technological choices, multilingual and multi-tenant architectures, human-computer interface options, graphical navigation between concepts, graphical and textual cognitive metrics, collaboration, and cooperation tools, including thesis debate, are presented. It is aimed at teachers, students, and the community to build, evolve, and share concept maps using collaborative and cooperative strategies according to the Meaningful Learning Theory. Following the Design Science Research methodology, the following steps were successfully carried out: identification and problem awareness, systematic literature review, design, development, and artifact pilot tests. In the next step, case studies will be carried out with formal education classes to validate the pedagogical hypothesis that semantic networks of concept maps can support meaningful learning in a multidiscipline and social-interactive perspective.

Keywords

• semantic networks
• concept maps
• multi-tenant architecture
• multilingual systems
• interdisciplinary learning
• socio-interactionist learning
• thesis debate