KnowLearn: Evaluating cross-subjects interactive learning by deploying knowledge graph

In the realm of Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) education, various factors play a crucial role in shaping students' acceptance of the learning environments facilitated by visualization technologies, such as virtual reality (VR). Works on leveraging the heterogeneous educational information (i.e., pedagogical data, student performance data, and student survey data) to identify essential factors influencing students' learning experience and performance in virtual environments are still insufficient. This research proposed KnowLearn, an interactive learning assistant system, to integrate an educational knowledge graph (KG) and a locally deployed large language model (LLM) to generate real-time personalized learning recommendations. As the knowledge base of KnowLearn, the educational KG accommodated multi-faceted educational information from twelve perspectives, such as the teaching content, students' academic performance, and their perceived confidence in a specific course from the AEC discipline. A heterogeneous graph attention network (HAN) was utilized to infer the latent information in the KG and, thus, identified the perceived confidence, intention to use, and performance in a relevant quiz as the top three indicators that significantly influenced students' learning outcomes. Based on the information preserved in the KG and learned from the HAN model, the LLM enhanced the personalization of recommendations concerning adopting virtual learning environments while protecting students' privacy. The proposed KnowLearn system is expected to feasibly provide enhanced recommendations on the teaching module design for educators from the AEC domain.