5 papers
The Impact of Item-Writing Flaws on Difficulty and Discrimination in Item Response Theory
Robin Schmucker, Steven Moore
High-quality test items are essential for educational assessments, particularly within Item Response Theory (IRT). Traditional validation methods rely on resource-intensive pilot t…
Learning to Optimize Feedback for One Million Students: Insights from Multi-Armed and Contextual Bandits in Large-Scale Online Tutoring
Robin Schmucker, Nimish Pachapurkar, Shanmuga Bala +2
We present an online tutoring system that learns to provide effective feedback to students after they answer questions incorrectly. Using data from one million students, the system…
Optimizing Mastery Learning by Fast-Forwarding Over-Practice Steps
Meng Xia, Robin Schmucker, Conrad Borchers +1
Mastery learning improves learning proficiency and efficiency. However, the overpractice of skills--students spending time on skills they have already mastered--remains a fundament…
AI Mentors for Student Projects: Spotting Early Issues in Computer Science Proposals
Gati Aher, Robin Schmucker, Tom Mitchell +1
When executed well, project-based learning (PBL) engages students' intrinsic motivation, encourages students to learn far beyond a course's limited curriculum, and prepares student…
TutorUp: What If Your Students Were Simulated? Training Tutors to Address Engagement Challenges in Online Learning
Sitong Pan, Robin Schmucker, Bernardo Garcia Bulle Bueno +5
With the rise of online learning, many novice tutors lack experience engaging students remotely. We introduce TutorUp, a Large Language Model (LLM)-based system that enables novice…