Understanding
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Questions associated with understanding learning objects
- What is the precedent for the current notion of learning objects
and how might this frame a definition?
- How do different groups (disparate disciplines within higher education,
P-12, public service media, museums, industry, business, and government)
conceptualize learning objects?
- How can the breadth and scope of learning objects be determined,
articulated, and portrayed?
- How do classification schemes such as metadata, schema, and taxonomies
relate to the definition of learning object?
Relevant resources
- Robert J. Beck's (Centre for International Education) Learning
Objects site presents a well-rounded description of various aspects
of learning objects: characterizations, examples (global, general),
collections (including general, discipline-specific and commercial
repositories), organizations associated with metadata and a selected
bibliography of further resources.
- ATL (Academic Technologies for Learning). Learning
Objects Presentation. This Web site provides a comprehensive overview
and several examples of learning objects (applets, animations, video
and audio clips).
- Connecting
learning objects to instructional design theory: A definition, a metaphor
and a taxonomy is the first chapter of a book co-authored and
edited by David Wiley entitled "The Instructional Use of Learning
Objects". In this chapter, three concerns are discussed: the
confusion created by various definitions of "learning object" and
the lack of attention to instructional design theory in the learning
object enterprise; a critique of the Lego metaphor and the recommendation
of a the atom metaphor; the construction of a neutral taxonomy to
facilitate successful learning experiences.
- Use
and abuse of reusable learning objects. Polsani sets out to "...
assess current definitions of the term Learning Object, to articulate
the foundational principles for developing a concept of LOs, and to
provide a methodology and broad set of guidelines for creating LOs".
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Policy |
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Questions related to policy
- What issues are related to intellectual properties and copyright?
- How are organizations supporting faculty development of learning
objects and providing incentives?
- How can we compare benefits of reuse and the cost of cataloguing?
- How should build or buy decisions be made for enterprise-wide systems?
- What guidelines should an organization use when developing enterprise-wide
systems?
- How can universities and colleges effectively influence vendors
to meet higher education's needs?
- How do or will reusable objects affect costs, how do we know, and
how do we plan for research into this issue?
Relevant resources
- The
Teacher's Outrageous Claim of Intellectual Property. Wiley argues
that the very idea of intellectual property is incompatible with the
idea of teaching and that the Internet is an egalitarian facilitator
of education opportunity through resource distribution. Wiley's clear
position is that teaching is synonymous with sharing.
- Transforming
Teaching in a Student-Centered World. This article describes 5
sessions presented at the January 2003 NLII annual meeting focusing
on faculty development and the use of learning objects. A common recurring
theme was the need to create faculty development systems that are
scalable and flexible - that stimulate and engage faculty. This article
discusses techniques to engage faculty and include them in the development,
use and ownership of learning objects.
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Teaching and Learning |
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Questions related to teaching and learning
- What innovative design guidelines and processes have resulted in
instructional software or systems being used across the curriculum
to transform instruction?
- In what ways is instruction being transformed by the learning objects
work of national and international standards and open-source initiatives
such as Internet2, OKI (Open Knowledge Initiative), the IMS, and MERLOT?
- In what ways might learning theory inform design and development?
- In what ways are technology-mediated learning (higher education)
and training (industry and military) similar and different, and how
might this affect the use of learning objects?
- How can learning objects be developed to adapt to different learning
needs and abilities?
- How will faculty and students react to a pedagogical shift toward
the use of learning objects?
Relevant resources
- The
Learning Object Primer. Warren Longmire writes "As learning content
developers look at these initiatives that focus on packaging, identifying,
and exchanging content, they are bound to ask, 'What does this mean
for me? How will my work be different in the future?'" This article
describes some of the challenges and opportunities that reusable learning
objects (RLOs) present to content developers as the object-oriented
approach is adopted in more learning interventions.
- Learning
Objects: Difficulties and Opportunities. David Wiley, Utah State
University, describes the mainstream learning objects movement, disparities
between learning objects approaches and the current research on learning
and opportunities for learning objects to be productive tools in facilitating
learning. Various issues are identified including: degrees of contextualization;
megaphone not mediator; scaling through automation vs. interacting
with other people; databanking education vs. discourse or dialogue;
perceived learning object reusability vs. extensive retooling to make
reusable; cost of decontexualized vs. contextualized learning objects;
use of learning objects for lower order learning outcomes vs. higher
order learning outcomes; learning objects with content vs. learning
objects with instructional strategies; educational objects economy
vs. educational resource commons (Free distribution).
- Three
Objections to Learning Objects. Norm Friesen, outlines a number
of problems associated with learning objects, all of which arise from
the juxtaposition of narrow technical and specialized concepts with
the general and varied dimensions and contexts of learning.
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Development |
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Questions associated with developing learning objects
- What processes currently exist for the development of learning objects?
- How are organizations dealing with student user interfaces?
- How do classification schemes such as metadata, schema, and taxonomies
interact with the design, development, and application of learning
objects?
- What effect are the standards and technical specification development
activities of national and international organizations such as SCORM,
LOM, and the IMS having on the development of learning objects?
- How will the development of learning objects align with the use
of different course management systems?
Relevant resources
- CanCore
Guidelines 1.9 Documents (written by Norm Friesen, Sue Fisher,
Lori Tozer, Anthony Roberts, Susan Hesemeier, Scott Habkirk). These
guidelines are updated to reflect consultations with implementers
undertaken between January and June, 2003. These guidelines are synchronized
with the IEEE LOM standard, and include best practice recommendations
for all LOM elements.
- Semantic
and Syntactic interoperability for learning object metadata. Friesen
writes, "CanCore goes further than other application profiles in interpreting
and explicating element and vocabulary semantics, and in both reflecting
and attempting to reinforce best and common practices. However, CanCore
is incapable of shielding technical implementers from the characteristics
of the syntactic implications of the LOM data model. The full set
of elements and hierarchical interrelationships as outlined in the
LOM provide, by definition, the simplest common set of conditions
for achieving technical interoperability".
- A
university-wide system for creating, capturing, and delivering learning
objects. South and Monson give one example of the challenges,
rationale and solutions for developing and integrating learning objects
in a university setting. The authors envision learning objects at
the center of the future design of the education system in this particular
university.
- The
one standard, LOM and the semantic web. Kraan examines the argument
presented by Stephen Downes, One standard for all: Why we don't want
it, Why we don't need it. The flexible, decentralized, democratic
and continuously growing accumulation of learning object descriptions
made possible by RDF represents the best way to go. The LOM is words;
RDF is grammar. LOM intentionally constrains; RDF is very flexible
indeed.
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Management
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Questions associated with managing learning objects
- How are current repositories organized, managed, and accessed?
- How (and by whom) will meta-tagging of content be carried out?
- How are organizations dealing with back-office integration (integration
or interoperability of administrative and academic computing systems)?
- What are the implementation issues in creating IMS and other specification-compliant
applications?
- How will the faculty development staffing model change to create
and support the use of learning objects?
- What research is being conducted on federating searches across
repositories and in harvesting metadata to accomplish "Google-like"
database queries?
Relevant resources
- Academic Technologies for Learning (2001).
Learning Object Repositories: Collaborating for Educational Excellence.
This paper defines the underlying concepts related to learning objects,
the status of learning objects at the University of Alberta, and the
issues inherent in collaborating to develop learning object repositories.
- eduSource
This site contains information about the eduSource Project, eduSource
partners, planning documents, work packages and a listing of repositories.
Also included is information about the CANARIE Learning Program.
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