A Multimodal Platform to Teach Mathematics to Students with Vision-Impairment

摘要

The advancements in Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies in the last decade have led many developers, universities, and researchers to invest in the research and development of digital teaching platforms. This paper compares existing features implemented in the first prototype and provides visually impaired high-school students with a system to learn and practice mathematical problems. This project describes possibilities provided by open-source APIs such as Natural Language Toolkit (NLTK) and shows how to implement them to make education universal and accessible. We aim to achieve this by introducing an open-source platform, which will provide a set of modules for personalized speech recognition and accessible online tutoring. The system is divided into two modules: First, an intelligent conversational agent to help students learn new mathematical concepts, which opens up possibilities of providing students with a personalized response. Second, a mathematical expression parser and evaluator to help the student practice mathematical questions. The implementation and development of the system shall open doors towards self-directed learning for visually impaired students.