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SPeL 2011
4th International Workshop on Social and Personal Computing for Web-Supported Learning Communities
http://software.ucv.ro/~epopescu/spel2011/

in conjunction with ICWL 2011
The 10th International Conference on Web-based Learning
http://www.hkws.org/conference/icwl2011/

Hong Kong
8-10 December 2011

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Motivation
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The workshop follows the previous SPeL 2008, SPeL 2009 and SPeL 2010 editions (http://software.ucv.ro/~epopescu/spel2011/previous.php). The general topic of the workshop is the social and personal computing for web-supported learning communities.

Web-based learning is moving from centralized, institution-based systems to a decentralized and informal creation and sharing of knowledge. Social software (e.g., blogs, wikis, podcasts, media-sharing services) is increasingly being used for e-learning purposes, helping to create novel learning experiences and knowledge. In the world of pervasive Internet, learners are also evolving: the so-called “digital natives” want to be in constant communication with their peers, they expect an individualized instruction and a personalized learning environment, which automatically adapt to their individual needs.

This workshop deals with current research on collaboration and personalization issues in Web-supported learning communities, leading towards the creation of a truly social and adaptive learning environment. Its aim is to provide a forum for discussing new trends and initiatives in this area, including research about the planning, development, application, and evaluation of intelligent e-learning systems, where people can learn together in a personalized way through social interaction with other learners.

This installment of the workshop is intended to have as a special theme the provision of intelligent, adaptive support for collaborative learning. In this context, we will solicit contributions that converge on this topic, either from the perspective of collaborative learning theory and practice (highlighting opportunities for the introduction of intelligent support in the process), or from the perspective of adaptive learning methods and techniques (traditionally more individual learner-oriented). This is aimed at complementing the workshop’s general themes, and focusing on an emergent research area that is expected to have major impact in the area of e-learning in the coming years.


Topics of interest
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The workshop welcomes submissions covering aspects of collaboration, social interactions, adaptivity and personalization in technology enhanced learning, particularly related to issues about:

* Social learning environments
* Theory and modeling of social computing in education
* Web 2.0 tools for collaborative learning
* Lifelong learning networks
* Social- and group- learning theory
* Knowledge community formation and support
* Virtual spaces for learning communities
* Social networks analysis and mining
* Computer-supported collaborative learning
* Personalized and adaptive learning
* Adaptation methods and techniques for groups of learners
* Intelligent learner and group modeling
* Adaptive Web interfaces for learning scenarios
* Collaborative filtering and recommendations for learners
* Metadata, folksonomies and tagging
* Social information retrieval
* Mobile e-learning applications
* Intelligent agent technology in web-based education
* Cognitive, motivational and affective aspects
* Practice and experience sharing


Paper submission and publication
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All accepted workshop papers will be published as a post-proceedings volume in Springer Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS). This will give authors an opportunity to revise their papers in the light of the feedback they will receive during the paper presentations and discussions at the ICWL 2011 conference.

The length of the workshop papers should not exceed 10 pages and should be formatted according to the Springer LNCS Authors Guidelines (http://www.springer.com/computer/lncs?SGWID=0-164-6-793341-0).

Submissions system: http://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=spel2011.


Important dates
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September 3, 2011 Abstract submission
September 10, 2011 Full paper submission
October 5, 2011 Acceptance notification
October 15, 2011 Camera ready paper & Registration
December 8-10, 2011 ICWL 2011 conference (exact workshop date is TBA)


Workshop Chairs
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Elvira Popescu - University of Craiova, Romania
Sabine Graf - Athabasca University, Canada
Alexandros Paramythis - Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria
Stavros Demetriadis - Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece


Program Committee
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http://software.ucv.ro/~epopescu/spel2011/committee.php


Please refer to the workshop website (http://software.ucv.ro/~epopescu/spel2011) for more information and send us email at spel2011@easychair.org for any inquiry.