Architecture of a collaborative tutoring system

One of the objectives of online learning systems is to support new learners in order to minimise failure problems and to increase training success. The availability of assistance and guidance can improve cognitive and behavioural levels of learners. This task is dedicated to a human actor, who is “the tutor”. In existing tutoring systems, learner is assigned to one and only one human tutor. The latter can found some problems when the type of required assistance of his learner doesn’t belong to his skills. In addition, the absence of the tutor during a long time for technical or professional reasons is another problem. To overcome these limitations, we study the collaboration among tutors to carry out the task of learner's monitoring that will enable tutors to meet all the needs of learners seeking assistance. In this case, we face a new research field, which is “CSCTT: Computer-Supported Collaborative TuToring”. In CSCTT, tutors are organized into small groups randomly or according to their skills. They work together using communication tools to monitor and guide their learners. In this article, we present basic principles of a new research field (i.e. CSCTT), which supports collaboration among human tutors. We also offer collaboration model among tutors and a general architecture of a CSCTT system.