Enabling Novel Knowledge Sharing with Activity Ontology Model in Collaborative Learning Environments

Activity knowledge sharing is an imperative and challenging issue in the CSCL field. On the basis of learning Activity Theory, this paper proposes a collaborative learning activity model by utilizing ontology technology, where many important factors are taken into consideration according to pedagogical requirements, e.g. enabling Subject ontology! with social relations, and providing Interaction ontology with rule control. Then, a spiral activity knowledge creation model is constructed for an incremental knowledge creation cycle, and the detailed implementation is put into practice via different ontology rule languages (such as OWL, FOAF and SWRL), Protege and some conversion tools, etc., And then, an integrated sharing model of activity knowledge is designed for convenient CSCL applications. Finally, an application case is demonstrated, and its results suggest that it obviously improves the effects and efficiencies of collaboration learning.