Design and evaluation of an adaptive content management learning system for children with autism / Khaled M A Ismail

Khaled , M A Ismail (2019) Design and evaluation of an adaptive content management learning system for children with autism / Khaled M A Ismail. PhD thesis, University of Malaya.

	PDF (The Candidate's Agreement) Restricted to Repository staff only Download (210Kb)
	PDF (Thesis PhD) Restricted to Repository staff only until 31 December 2021. Download (3118Kb)

Abstract

The prevalence of autism in children in the world is estimated as one per 62 children, higher levels reported in some countries. These children experience significant problems with the development of social, behavioural and verbal and non-verbal communication skills. The skills impairment levels varies from an individual to another and that made teaching autistics a challenge for caregivers such as teachers and relatives. Hence, there are quite a number of frameworks of a software learning systems which focus on gaining the children’s attention using representational visual illustration as a learning method instead of the textual form. However, majority of these tools are lacking the personalisation ability to suite everyone in the spectrum. Assistive technology offers an alternative way to attract children with autism to use according to the finding of the preliminary study in chapter 3. Therefore, this research is proposing an Adaptive Content Management Learning System (ACMLS) model to assist caregivers to produce, design and fine-tune or customise the learning materials appropriately so that the system interface and the materials are suitable for every individual in the spectrum according to each child personal profile aiming to make learning attractive and to contribute in improving their social, communication and behavioural skills and nonetheless, their attention level to the delivered educational topics. The ACMLS model design adopts four main components which are: (1) Design component: which covers the visual design, design principles and the mental model of the children with autism. (2) Technology component: which covers the assistive technology tools and the architecture of the ACMLS system. (3) Education component: Which covers the learning objectives, styles, strategies, methods and the cognitive model. (4) Participants component: which covers the main participants who’re playing a role in the ACMLS model such as: caregivers and children with autism. The ACMLS model evaluation is done through four evaluation stages: intervention evaluation, usability heuristics evaluation, experts’ feedback and Neurosky Mindset feedback respectively in order to judge the model quality. The results of the model evaluation indicated that the proposed ACMLS model is an effective and efficient tool to be used rather than the traditional methods in the autism centres or schools.

Actions (For repository staff only : Login required)