A framework of the seminar-typed virtual classroom system for asynchronous participants Kenji Matsuura*, Hiroaki Ogata*, Yoneo Yano* * Faculty of Engineering, Tokushima University 2-1, Minami-josanjima, Tokushima-shi, 770-8506, Japan E-mail: (matsuura, ogata, yano)@is.tokushima-u.ac.jp Abstract: This paper proposes a framework for AVC (Asynchronous Virtual Classroom) that allows each learner to communicate with others in a classroom at anytime. Many seminar-typed VC systems to solve the geographical distance problem have been studied. However, most of them are limited with the necessity of time-sharing. Therefore, we focused on the solution of its time-sharing problem by means of asynchronous learning environment with video and simulative discussion. In these environments, a learner is able to refer the learning material or the past discussions, to communicate with others at anytime, and to make notes of the lecture with the personal/shared notebook tool. The system accumulates and manages these interactions in order to reuse for later learners. In this way, AVC system encourages both individual and collaborative learning. Especially in this paper, we describe our framework and its prototype system. Keywords: Virtual classroom, distance learning, video on demand, asynchronous communication 1. Introduction It is getting more and more common to communicate with each other in a cyber-space. This movement, called CMC (Computer Mediated Communication), makes ordinary school-based classroom change into virtual one [1]. Some researchers apply CMC to the lifelong learning environment [2-4]. There are various studies of virtual classroom/school [5-7]. Some researchers studies a cognitive model in the collaborative environment [8-10], others studies how to realize the ideal virtual classroom. For instances, Murray studies on ideal virtual classroom designing [11]. A kind of such “virtual classroom” in the cyber-space has the availability to solve not only spatial problem but also time-sharing problem among users in essence. It is evidently convenient for users including learners and teachers that they can study in a virtual classroom/school at anytime. There are lots of well-known commercial software for authoring a seminar-typed courseware system. They have the purpose to encourage individual learning using WWW and to support instructor’s making, editing and authoring materials. Most of them might apply to integrate popular asynchronous communication tools like e-mail or bulletin board in order to propose asynchronous communication spaces. However, the ways to utilize the results of the communication