Website: http://smartlaboratory.ca/

Coming to Canada from

University of Memphis, USA

Research involves

Improving understanding of the processes that are used during learning with advanced learning technologies.

Research relevance

This research will lead to the development of advanced learning technologies that will improve learning in academic and professional environments.

Responding to learners’ needs with advanced technologies

Do advanced learning technologies such as games, multimedia, hypermedia, web-based environments and simulations really have an impact on learning? Some people believe these new technologies are the panacea to society’s social, learning and cultural challenges. But Dr. Roger Azevedo, Canada Research Chair in Metacognition and Advanced Learning Technologies, isn’t one of them.

Azevedo believes these technologies pose several challenges for learners that impede their ability to learn. One of the major reasons is that most students fail to use key processes (such as cognitive, motivational and emotional) when they use these technologies.

He aims to build environments that will respond intelligently to learners’ needs by detecting, tracking, modeling and fostering the processes involved during learning. For example, such an environment would adapt to learners if it detected they were frustrated because they did not have the cognitive skills necessary to understand the material or lacked interest in its contents.

Azevedo is also examining the complex nature of the self-regulatory processes people use to learn with technology-based learning environments. This involves detecting, capturing, identifying and classifying these processes as they unfold while people interact with these technologies during learning.

Azevedo’s research will help build learning environments that are capable of adapting to fluctuations in the self-regulatory processes people use during learning with advanced learning technologies.