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Chapter 7
INTRODUCTION
Learners are asking for intelligent services in or-
der to discover and access the content they need.
The mechanism for discovering Web documents
are powerful search engines, with specialized
discovery services, indexes, and databases. But, a
simple query can produce hundreds or thousands
of results, making it practically impossible for the
trainee to check the relevance of each of them.
.This chapter argues that grouping the results
into relevant clusters might make the learner to
use them more efficiently. The chapter describes
Constanta-Nicoleta Bodea
Academy of Economic Studies, Romania
Maria-Iuliana Dascalu
Academy of Economic Studies, Romania
Adina Lipai
Academy of Economic Studies, Romania
Clustering of the Web Search
Results in Educational
Recommender Systems
ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a meta-search approach, meant to deliver bibliography from the internet, according
to trainees’ results obtained at an e-assessment task. The bibliography consists of web pages related to
the knowledge gaps of the trainees. The meta-search engine is part of an education recommender system,
attached to an e-assessment application for project management knowledge. Meta-search means that, for
a specifc query (or mistake made by the trainee), several search mechanisms for suitable bibliography
(further reading) could be applied. The lists of results delivered by the standard search mechanisms
are used to build thematically homogenous groups using an ontology-based clustering algorithm. The
clustering process uses an educational ontology and WordNet lexical database to create its categories.
The research is presented in the context of recommender systems and their various applications to the
education domain.
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-61350-489-5.ch007