Articles/Books Citation
1. Psotka & Shute (1996). Intelligent Tutoring Systems: Past, Present, and Future.
2. Lajorie & Derry (1993). Computers as Cognitive Tools.

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Overview
The articles cover a broad view of intelligent tutoring systems (ITS) and what the past present and future holds for it. I found the reading to be very interesting and informative at the same time.

Intelligent Tutoring System: Past, Present, and Future (Shute and Psotka)
This article discusses the aspects of intelligent tutoring systems (ITS) and how it has grown from discovering the capabilities of ITS to implementing ITS into actual learning environments and, hopefully, to enhancing the ways students learn. I liked how the author pointed out that the goal of ITS is to communicate its embedded knowledge effectively and not necessarily the same way of human teachers. Because human teachers can make mistakes also and sometimes may communicate inappropriately or ineffectively. ITS had a very different approach to computer-assisted instructions (CAI). In CAI, when the students answered a question, they would either get correct feedback or an incorrect feedback. If they got an incorrect feedback, then they would get remediation. In ITS, the student’s response is judged more critically. If the students got an incorrect answer, they tutor would diagnose the problem and tell why they got the answer incorrect and provide suggestions, ways of improving their skills, or send them to a less difficult question for them to answer. I like the latter approach because the instructions are more tailored to the student. It knows how the learner is progressing and what areas they need more helps on. The ITS can provide those the learner in which the CAI cannot.

The past 20 years (1970-1990) had a lot of different types of tutoring systems. It was interesting to see how ITS evolved through the years. In the 1970s, people were all eager to build ITS systems but most did not thoroughly analyze the problems that could occur. In the 1980s, people started to focus more on improving the ITS by providing detailed feedback for a particular learner, adaptable to student’s conceptualization, providing more theoretical framework, and allows learners to interact and explore the learning environment. In the 1990s, people started to focus more on the amount of control learners should have, if learning should be individualized or collaborative, and how virtual reality can be brought to learning. A lot of these ITS systems died out, but I think there is a huge growth for simulations and collaborative learning environments. Simulations provide learners with a very realistic environment in which allows them to explore and do tasks in which are almost identical to the real environment. These are very crucial for situations in which peoples lives are on the line, such as pilots, astronauts, and weapons and bomb specialist. Collaborative learning environments are in great demand, especially because of the rise of online courses and instructions. Social interaction is very crucial for any learning setting. It is very difficult to learn at the fullest potential without some sort of collaboration.

I like how the authors discussed the potential future of ITS. I find it to be very interesting and open a lot of doors to ideas and future research.

Summary of the other Articles
I think the reading provided me with a lot of knowledge on ITS and its capabilities. There are a lot of positives and negatives of ITS. Many people associate intelligence with awareness. Since no systems has been built that provides it with awareness, people are doubting the capabilities and worthwhile ness of ITS. Other people believe that it is nearly impossible to determine all of the solution paths that a student might take in a complex problem-solving domain. Also, people feel that the model-tracing approach is applicable only to procedural learning, but it leaves out other important issues such as critical thinking and higher-order problem solving. I think they make good points. I don’t think ITS is good for every single situation. In some situations, it is better to have a real life tutor/instructor to guide the learner. It just depends on the situation and tasks that the learners must achieve.