Dynamic evolving virtual classroom

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9646508-B2
Application number	US-201213539109-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jun 29, 2012
Priority date	Jun 29, 2012
Publication date	May 9, 2017
Grant date	May 9, 2017

Abstract

According to an aspect of an embodiment, a method of providing a virtual class includes providing access to temporally-dimensioned educational material to participants of the virtual class in a social network. The method may also include capturing supplemental material generated by the participants interacting with each other in real-time in the social network. The method may also include associating the supplemental material with a range of relative time within the temporally-dimensioned educational material. The method may also include providing the temporally-dimensioned educational material to a client device associated with a participant of the virtual class. The method may also include providing the supplemental material to the client device for presentation at the client device during the range of relative time within the temporally-dimensioned educational material.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A system of providing a virtual class, comprising:
a social network configured to allow participants of a virtual class to interact with each other in real-time and generate supplemental material related to temporally-dimensioned educational material, wherein the supplemental material includes one or more units of supplemental material related to the temporally-dimensioned educational material, wherein the social network includes a profile of the participant; the profile comprises one or more attributes of the participant; and
a server communicatively coupled to the social network, the server configured to:
provide access to the temporally-dimensioned educational material to the participants of the virtual class, wherein the participants comprise students;
capture the one or more units of supplemental material in real time during the virtual class;
associate the one or more units of supplemental material with a corresponding range of relative time within the temporally-dimensioned educational material;
provide the temporally-dimensioned educational material via a participant user interface of a client device associated with a participant of the virtual class, wherein at least one unit of supplement material is received from the participant via the participant user interface;
determine one or more ratings associated with the one or more units of supplemental material;
access the profile of the participant from the social network;
identify a set of participants within the social network that are associated with the participant based on the profile of the participant;
filter the one or more units of supplemental material based on the one or more ratings and one or more attributes of the one or more units of supplemental material comprising one or more attributes related to the attributes of the profile of the participant to output at least one unit of supplemental material that associates with a corresponding rating satisfying a predetermined threshold; and
provide the at least one unit of supplemental material to the client device for presentation at the client device during the corresponding range of relative time within the temporally-dimensioned educational material.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the server is configured to filter the one or more units of supplemental material by
filtering the one or more units of supplemental material based on one or more participants who added the one or more units of supplemental material to provide to the participant the at least one unit of supplemental material added by at least one of the associated set of participants.

3. The system of claim 1 , wherein the server is further configured to recommend to the participant a mentoring relationship with at least one of the associated set of participants.

4. The system of claim 1 , the server comprising:
an activity database configured to store the supplemental material; and
an event database configured to store data indicating the corresponding range of relative time associated with the one or more units of supplemental material.

5. The system of claim 1 , the server comprising:
an event generator configured to trigger a time event based on the corresponding range of relative time associated with the at least one unit of supplemental material; and
a data extraction module configured to provide the at least one unit of supplemental material to the client device associated with the participant over the corresponding range of relative time associated with the at least one unit of supplemental material in response to the time event triggered by the event generator.

6. The system of claim 5 , further comprising a presentation module configured to provide the temporally-dimensioned educational material to the participants in one or more formats comprising at least one of an audio format and a video format.

7. The system of claim 1 , wherein the supplemental material comprises one or more of:
an audio recording;
a video recording;
a text file including textual content of messages exchanged between the participants of the virtual class;
an uploaded document; and
a link to content available on a network.

8. The system of claim 1 , wherein the server comprises one or more of:
a feedback module configured to allow the participants to leave feedback for an administrator of the temporally-dimensioned educational material;
a video chat module configured to allow the participants to have video conversations with each other;
an audio module configured to allow the participants to have audio conversations with each other;
a messaging module configured to allow the participants to have textual conversations with each other;
a posting module configured to allow the participants to upload documents or post links to documents; and
a rating module configured to allow the participants to rate the supplemental material based on a rating system such that the one or more ratings are assigned to the one or more units of supplemental material.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein the server comprises a filtering module configured to filter the one or more units of supplemental material.

10. The system of claim 9 , wherein the filtering module is configured to filter the one or more units of supplemental material by filtering out any of the one or more units of supplemental material having a rating below the predetermined threshold.

11. A method of providing a virtual class, comprising:
providing access to temporally-dimensioned educational material to participants of the virtual class in a social network, wherein the participants comprises students;
capturing supplemental material generated by the participants interacting with each other in real-time in the social network, wherein the supplemental material includes one or more units of supplemental material related to the temporally-dimensioned educational material;
associating the one or more units of supplemental material with a corresponding range of relative time within the temporally-dimensioned educational material;
providing the temporally-dimensioned educational material via a participant user interface of a client device associated with a participant of the virtual class, wherein at least one unit of supplement material is received from the participant via the participant user interface;
determining one or more ratings associated with the one or more units of supplemental material;
accessing the profile of the participant from the social network;
identifying a set of participants within the social network that are associated with the participant based on the profile of the participant;
filtering the one or more units of supplemental material based on the one or more ratings and one or more attributes of the one or more units of supplemental material to provide to the participant the at least one unit of supplemental material comprising one or more attributes related to the attributes of the profile of the participant to output at least one unit of supplemental material that associates with a corresponding rating satisfying a predetermined threshold; and
providing the at least one unit of supplemental material to the client device for presentation at the client device during the corresponding range of relative time within the temporally-dimensioned educational material.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the filtering comprises filtering the one or more units of supplemental material based on one or more participants who added the one or more units of supplemental material to provide to the participant the at least one unit of supplemental material added by at least one of the associated

Assignees

• Reddy Subodh M
• Uchino Kanji
• Fujitsu Ltd

Inventors

• Reddy Subodh M
• Uchino Kanji

Classifications

• G09B7/02 Primary

  of the type wherein the student is expected to construct an answer to the question which is presented or wherein the machine gives an answer to the question presented by a student · CPC title