Second Call for Papers

Applications of Semantics, Opinion and Sentiments in eLearning
                        (ASOS)

         Workshop organized under the joint aegis of
             ELSNET and the LT4eL FP6  project
                To be held at EUROLAN 2007
              July 23-27 2007 Iasi, Romania

          http://eurolan.info.uaic.ro/2007/ASOS

        Paper submission deadline: May 21st, 2007


The  workshop  will  address  the main themes of the EUROLAN-2007
Summer School, that is  Semantics, Opinions and Sentiments (SOS),
in relation with eLearning.

One  of  the  main  benefits  of  education is that it allows the
student  to  come  into  direct  contact  with  the  lecturer. In
face-to-face  classroom  education,  a  significant  part  of the
formation is based on this activity, in which the student listens
to  the  lecturer,  and  is  supposed  to be conquered by her/his
eloquence,  by  her/his  vocabulary  and  style, by the charm and
charismatic presence of a human  being. The role of a lecturer is
to transmit not only knowledge, but also passion, discipline, and
moral values. Very  often, sentiments, as  let to be perceived by
the lecturer and the  student, influence crucially the quality of
education.  Emotions  and  their  expression  should be perceived
either  as  a  feedback  in  the  reaction of the student or as a
component of the didactic activities.

Within technology  enhanced learning,  interaction is mediated by
the  computer  and  the  role  of  the human lecturer seems to be
diminished.  However,  a  new  generation of eLearning systems is
being developed,  in which  the human  component will play a much
more  relevant  role.  The  challenge  is  to  make  the learning
activities,  in  which  the   computer  gains  a  more  and  more
significant position, as natural as possible.

The intent of the workshop  is to present new work and innovating
ideas for the development  of eLearning systems that will exploit
opinions and  sentiments in  the communication  between the tutor
(real  or  virtual)  and  the  student.  The following topics are
relevant for the ASOS event:

* molecules of emotion, sentiment classification and modeling
* automatic and semi-automatic discovery of subjectivity
  indicators in education
* signaling and controlling sentiments in learning objects
* separation of subjectivity and objectivity in educational
  materials
* automatic generation of learning objects by integrating
  opinions and sentiments into content
* humor recognition and generation in educational media
* tracking themes and opinions over time
* annotation for deep semantics, sentiment, and subjectivity in
  eLearning
* subjectivity/sentiment and analysis of discourse and dialogue
  in chats, blogs, forums and interactive educational systems
* educational interfaces involving avatars displaying emotion
* communicating emotion in intelligent educational systems
* sentiments, opinions and rational behaviors in educational
  environments
* relationship between intelligent systems and emotional systems
* novel intelligent learning structures for emotional function
  and eLearning
* implementation of emotional systems and e-learning systems
* expressivity communicated in learning environments through
  speech and text
* applications of SOS to improve personalized and adaptive
  learning, adaptive information filtering and retrieval,
  intelligent tutoring
* behavior, emotions and sentiment ontologies
* evaluation of SOS in eLearning environments
* evaluation of emotional eLearning systems
* multilingual aspects in all the above

Papers are invited on substantial, original, and unpublished work
within the workshop themes.  All submissions  (even if they focus
on  only  one a spect  of  the mentioned topics)  should show how
eLearning  could  benefit  from  the  results.

We  encourage  submissions  by  YOUNG RESEARCHERS  even if their
research is in its initial stage since the workshop will give the
chance to presenters to shape their ideas and receive feedback.

The workshop will run  for three-four consecutive evenings during
the EUROLAN-07 Summer School.  Selected proposals will be invited
for a 30 minutes presentation  which will be followed by one hour
discussion moderated  by a  member of  the Program Committee. The
papers presented,  together with  a text summarizing the recorded
discussions following  the presentations,  will be published in a
volume in the "Al.I.Cuza" Publishing House.

The best reviewed  submission will be  granted a scholarship from
the  LT4eL  European  Project (http://www.lt4el.eu/) to cover the
EUROLAN registration fee.

Proposals should be no  longer than 8 pages, references excluded,
and should be structured as follows:
- title, authors and affiliations
- short   presentation   of   the  domain  and  related  work/and
  achievements
- your own previous work in this area (if existent)
- the main idea of the proposal
- your expected feedback from  the audience, including some major
  questions that you want to address
- the potential and feasibility of the idea
- the foreseen dangers
- references

In order  for your  proposal to  be selected, you should convince
the Program Committee that it is SMART (Specific to the mentioned
field,  the  effort  encumbered  be Measurable, its objectives be
Achievable, the outcome be  Relevant, and its realization be well
Time-framed).

Submissions will be electronic. The  papers will be uploaded on a
special  page,  details can be found on  the  web  page of the ASOS
workshop. Important dates:
* Paper submissions deadline: May 21, 2007
* Notification of acceptance: June 11, 2007
* Presentations / final papers due: July 9, 2007
* Summer School dates: July 23 - August 3, 2007

Authors of accepted  papers must register  for the EUROLAN Summer
School  and  present   their  work  at   the  ASOS  workshop.  No
supplementary  fee  will  be  required above the EUROLAN fee. All
accepted  authors  will  benefit  from the early registration fee
regardless of the  date they register.  Participation in the ASOS
workshop is open to all EUROLAN-2007 attendants.

Program Committee:

- Antonio Branco, University of Lisbon
- Dan Cristea, Al.I. Cuza University of Iasi
- Diane Evans, Open University
- Corina Forascu, Al.I. Cuza University of Iasi
- Erhard Hinrichs, Tübingen University
- Susanne  J.  Jekat,   Zürich  University  of  Applied  Sciences
  Winterthur
- Walter v. Hahn, University of Hamburg
- Dirk Heylen, University of Twente
- Alex Killing, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zürich
- Steven Krauwer, Utrecht University
- Vladislav Kubon, Charles University - Prague
- Lothar Lemnitzer, Tübingen University
- Rada Mihalcea, University of Texas
- Paola Monachesi, Utrecht University
- Petya Osenova, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences
- Adam  Przepiórkowski,  Institute  of  Computer  Science, Polish
  Academy of Science
- Anne DeRoeck, Open University
- Mike Rosner, University of Malta
- Kiril Simov, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences
- Carlo Strapparava, IRST-ITC Trento
- Horia-Nicolai Teodorescu, Romanian Academy
- Dan Tufis, Romanian Academy
- Cristina Vertan, University of Hamburg
- Michael Zock, University of Marseille

Organizing Committee:

- Paola Monachesi, Utrecht University
- Steven Krauwer, Utrecht University

To contact the organizers, please use the following address:
  Paola.Monachesi@let.uu.nl