Subject: Re: IFETS-DISCUSS Digest - 21 Feb 2000 to 22 Feb 2000
From: Albert Ip (albert@dls.au.com)
Date: Wed 23 Feb 2000 - 04:18:46 MET
From: "Albert Ip" <albert@dls.au.com> Subject: Re: IFETS-DISCUSS Digest - 21 Feb 2000 to 22 Feb 2000 Date: Wed, 23 Feb 2000 14:18:46 +1100
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Hi,
I was on trip in the last two days and hence have the benefit of reading the
summary AND responding to some of the issues raised earlier.
I agree with David Wiles (Mon, 21 Feb 2000 17:45:28 -0500)
>This sequence makes a lot of sense to me. Samantha's summary creates an
>excellent hypotheses generating springboard for looking at the spring term.
On Mon, 21 Feb 2000 19:57:24 -0000 Samantha Hobbs summarised the
discussion:
>1. There has been some considerable discussion about the DEFINITION and
SIZE
>of an LO.
>
>Kahn and Lowney draw comparisons between software components and LOs with
>Kahn suggesting that LOs may experience the same lack of success as
>independent software components such as word processing packages and spell
>checkers. Quinn extends this analogy but puts forward the view that items
in
>a library for GUI widgets is nearer the size he would envisage.
I introduced the notion of "level of encapsulation" in order to understand
what we mean by LO. If LO is component in software engineering sense, we
should not have coined this term. So I think LO must have something else.
I started by
"Alfred Ip (15th Feb.) discusses reusability
of objects with respect to their granularity size. Alfred has also been
keeping a running list of the independent components of learning objects
needed to be considered in reuse; so far, the list includes content,
function, learning objectives, look and feel." - Sun, 20 Feb 2000
17:30:20 -0800 Cynthia Mazow
(BTW, I don't think there is an Alfred Ip here. Cynthia may be referring to
me - Albert IP :-) and I may just add that the "independent components of
LO" above actually means what are the qualities that we should associate
with LO in order to say a particular resource is a LO!)
I'm afraid that I can only partly agree with Alan that :The point then is
not "what is a learning object?" but "how can we appropriately classify such
objects for ease of access?" (Sun, 20 Feb 2000) . What is a learning object
is an equally important question in order to have an understanding of this
issue.
>Both Rowley and Gilbert reject the applicability of re-use to
>'commercial-grade' courses since the expected standards of 'harmonisation
>and customisation of courses would not be feasible. Gilbert goes on to
>suggests that since anything that is designed for educational use is
>designed for specific learner groups and learning aims in mind successful
>use for learning outside that scenario will be purely accidental.
>
>Both these contributors appear to see an LO as a whole course or at least a
>large, complex and coherent part of a course. This view is not shared by
>others who feel that for success, courses need to be decomposed into
smaller
>object which would be the LOs. These would then be combined, perhaps in
>hierarchies (Thompson and Downes) where at the higher level student is
>integrating lower level LOs.
>
>Other suggestions as to what might be considered LOs include
>'non-educational' or knowledge objects (Ip) and bulletin boards and
>collaborative activities (Quinn rejected by Dalgarno). There is some
>disagreement as to whether LOs can be tools or must be contentful and
>Dalgarno only accepts the relevance of LOs to subjects where there is
>'individual learning of concepts' such as the sciences. Ip, taking input
>from Lian and Schuyler, suggests that an LO has at least 4 subcomponents:
>content, functions, learning objectives and 'look and feel'. This is
>rejected by Downes who draws a distinction between 'components' which are
>self-contained entities (such as LOs) and 'variables' which are values and
>properties, such as colour or font size, which cannot exist on their own.
I have been careful in distinguishing resource from LO (re: distinction
between Learning Asset and LO as suggested by IEEE-LSTC vice-chair. BTW, I
am not supporting the notion that LA+metadata = LO. I believe there is
something more than that!). I also attempt to distinguish between resource
and LA hence introduce the notion of NEF resource. (I hope we don't get
into debate with terminology but seems quite unavoidable, e.g. Quinn
introduced yet another term "knowledge objects") I believe we are doing
this with good will - to clarify WHAT is LO?
Can I suggest that we come to an agreement with the terms we are using along
a line something like:
resource (any artifacts - whoop! a new term again!) which may or may not
have been created for sole educational consumption.
educational resource - artifacts created "with intention" to be used
educationally
NEF resource (Jon Mason (private communication many months ago) thought
that the term "non-educational" resource have negative annotations to
education community and hence is the NEF thing!) - artifacts that are
created "not for sole educational consumption" but may have potential values
in education.
to enable resource discovery, these resources may have metadata
associated with it (both embedded or detached). I reject the idea that
resource + educational metadata will promote such resources to the level of
LO!
IEEE's Learning Asset are most likely educational resources
So, what is Learning object? that brings back to my notion of "at least 4
subcomponents: content, functions, learning objectives and 'look and feel'"
Any more to add on this list so that an artifact can "promote" to the status
of LO?
I think there will be more confusion if we cannot understand that metadata
is a description of a resource and metadata is only surrogate of the
resource in order support manipulation or some other activities. Sometimes,
the description grows larger than the original resouce because we can
"add-values" to the resource by including additional information (e.g.
examplar use).
>The issue of the need to design LOs specifically for re-use was also raised
>(Kahn, Lowney and Schuyler)
Re-use implies: creation of LO and reassembling these LO into new context.
I guess the "new context" is where "re-purposing" is coming in.
Re-use in a "in-house" environment is not what a general education community
interested in. I don't have an interest how a company can re-use its own
resource to streamline its production process. (Disclaimer: I am the MD of
Digital Learning Systems P/L, a learning technology company, and hence AM
interested from the management point of view that my company's internal
objects are re-used as much as possible. In this context, I am wearing a
more academic hat!) Education community is interested in re-use of objects
which are created by different people who,during the production process, is
unaware of possible re-use. This extended re-use implies good protocol,
standard interface, standard variables exposed and so on so that the person
who is "glue-ing" the components together can customize to the level deem
appropriate. My work couples of years ago on "virtual apparatus framework"
identified two such independent "components" of LO (as explained above!)
Albert
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