Subject: Re: Learning Objects and Instruction Components
From: Frank Lowney (flowney@mail.gcsu.edu)
Date: Sun 13 Feb 2000 - 14:48:49 MET
Date: Sun, 13 Feb 2000 08:48:49 -0500 From: Frank Lowney <flowney@mail.gcsu.edu> Subject: Re: Learning Objects and Instruction Components
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Arun-Kumar Tripathi <tripathi@statistik.uni-dortmund.de> asks:
>Dear Dr. Frank Lowney,
>
>On Sat, 12 Feb 2000, Frank Lowney wrote:
>> In addition to http://www.eoe.org/ there is a related project called
> > MERLOT http://merlot.csuchico.edu/ that builds on EOE in several
>> important and useful ways.
>
>Thank you! MERLOT is a good learning tool. But, what is the philosophy
>behind it?
>
Since it is derived from and is a member of the EOE Foundation, its
conceptual and philosophic underpinnings are closely related to those
of the EOE Foundation and the IEEE Learning Technology Standards
Committee (LTSC). Thus, it is a tangible example of our current
discussion topic.
If you follow their "Learning Activities" link, you will see that,
while the MERLOT acronym indicates an aspiration to include more than
just Java Applets and Servlets, the current collection is still
dominated by Java Applets. Where MERLOT takes a further step is in
the feedback they solicit from users of an educational object:
* Add A Review
* Add Pedagogy
* Add Technical Comment
* Add IMS Metadata
The predominance of Java applets/servlets appears to be a function of
the promise that applications written in Java are "write once, run
anywhere." In other words, Java applets/servlets are highly
interoperable.
However, there are other approaches with equivalent interoperability
that should be considered. One that I believe has great potential in
this area are interactive QuickTime movies. While Apple Computer
(one of the original sponsors of the EOE, by the way) and most of its
customers conceive of QuickTime in terms of streaming A/V, it has
some very interesting but less well known attributes such as its
sprite, VR and text tracks. I attempted to illustrate this in an
unpublished paper
(http://www.faculty.de.gcsu.edu/~flowney/quicktime/TS/QT4Ed/) but
have been much more impressed with the work of others, especially
with Mike Matson's "Star Tower"
(http://www.apple.com/uk/education/schools/startower/index.html).
It's definitely worth a look.
=====================================================================
Dr. Frank Lowney flowney@mail.gcsu.edu
Director, Electronic Instructional Services, a unit of the
Office of Information and Instructional Technology,
CBX 034, Georgia College & State University
Milledgeville, GA 31061-0490
Voice: (912) 445-5260 Primary Web Sites:
GC EduNET (K-12) System: http://www.gcedunet.peachnet.edu
GC&SU's Official Site: http://www.gcsu.edu
Personal Pages: http://www.faculty.de.gcsu.edu/~flowney
=====================================================================
We don't make instruction effective, we make effective instruction
more accessible.
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