The article presents a heart rate variability (HRV) monitoring system for the detection of attention status during learning activity. Developing an embedded system, the ECG and PPG signals are acquired simultaneously. Acquired signal primary including peak detection was applied to extract information about peak to peak time intervals that is used to calculate the HR abut also HRV. The primary processing data are sent in real time to a database in the cloud. Subsequently, HRV is analysed based on Matlab implemented algorithms considering time and frequency domains as so as non-linear measures. Several tests were carried out and the recorded results were analysed as the starting point to classify situations that capture the state of attention.