Abstract: The advancement in the computer and internet technology makes e-Learning implementation in educational institutions is easy. All the educational institutions uses e-Learning to enhance the teaching learning process. This study proposes personalized e-Learning System framework using ontology by creating personalized ontology user models. This model learns the knowledge level of the learners in the e-Learning environment and strengthens the instructional design to make the content personalized. To measure the effectiveness of ontology based instructional design for introduction to Java programming, an experimental model has been constructed. This was accomplished by comparing the traditional method of teaching (instructor and textbook) and Java tutor to the students in the faculty of computer applications of BSA University in Chennai. A group of students were taught Java programming concepts using ontology based instructional design and a second group was taught the same concepts in parallel by traditional methods of teaching. Both groups were coordinated for similar background knowledge of the topics being taught. Post testing revealed that the Java tutor group achieved significantly higher scores than the group taught using the traditional method. Furthermore, the Java tutor group showed that the retention of specific topic of knowledge was better than the traditional method group.