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Benefits of Sharing and Reusing Learning Resources and How To

Achieve Them

Frans Van Assche

European Schoolnet

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Closing the gap between the stakeholders perspective and

Learning Technology (LT) experts

Objective of this study

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What went wrong

• There is a disconnect between benefits as seen by the stakeholders and the LT experts

• Stakeholders and LT experts did not communicate communicate too well in the past

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Today a deeper reflection

Reflection on

• What are the benefits of LT solutions offered?

• Does it really work ?

• Has it traction, has it a future ?

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How do we establish the benefits of LT solutions

• Difficult with known software engineering techniques

• Management science: Benefits Modelling Approach

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Benefits Line of Argument

Benefits Modelling Approach

Roles Enablers

Apply it to sharing and re-use of educational content

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Warning

Work in progress

To be completed summer 2010

Context: the ASPECT project

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Photosynthesis: 139 results

Food: 1,369 results

Agriculture: 379 results

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M.I.T.Open Courseware

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MoE Ireland

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Promethean

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Example Sharing and Reuse

• A teacher makes some material about the food pyramid

• She uploads and describes this on Promethean Planet

• Promethean Planet is harvested by the LRE• A librarian of an agricultural school with a

subscription to the LRE finds this an interesting resource and includes it in the school repository

• A teacher of this institution using Moodle finds it in the school repository

• The teacher adapts the material• The teacher delivers it in the classroom

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Benefits Line of Argument

Roles

Roles Enablers

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Primary Roles

• Author• User• Broker

– Content provider– Educational portal provider– Institutional librarian– Rights broker– Repository/referatory owner

• Consumer = Author or User

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Roles (continued)• Tools providers

– Authoring tools including content packaging tools– Translation tools– Metadata editors– Vocabulary editors, vocabulary mapping tools, vocabulary banks– Automatic Metadata Generators– Automatic Metadata Translators– Harvesters– Metadata exchange tools (plug-ins, brokerage systems)– Metadata discovery tools– Digital Rights Management– (Federated) Identity Management– Identifier Management– Localisation tools– Educational Content Players– VLE, PLE

• Procurement people• ICT co-ordinators• Policy makers• Researchers

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Benefits Line of Argument

Benefits

Roles Enablers

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Scoping of benefits

• Benefits are a concrete expression why we do things

• These expressions can be too general or too specific for our purpose. For example:– Too general: to foster the information society in

Europe -> How– Too specific: to be able to identify a learning

object in a unique way -> So what, why– Result of scoping: Benefits concerning share

and reuse of educational content

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Benefits within the scope result from processes leading to sharing and

reuse

Basic Assumption

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Processes concerning educational contentSharing & Reuse

Create

DiscoverySearch

Soc . Recommend .Alerts

Integrate

Evaluate Select

Procure

GetReference

or LOAdapt & ReuseDisaggregate

AggregateModify the content

Modify the sequence

Use/PlayIntegrate

LocalDelete

Retract

Expose

Describe ResolutionGather

MetadataEnrich

Adapt

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For each of these processes

• A benefit arises when we can make the process more effective or more efficient

• Effective– Greater effect– Good effect, an effect with value to some roles

• Efficient– Aka Output/Input; costs

• Greater value to roles at a lower cost

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Activities on Content• Create• Describe• Expose• Discover• Evaluate• Procurement• Resolution & Access control• Obtain• Gathering descriptive manifestations• Repurpose and reuse• Integrate• Using• Local delete• Retract

Can we make them more effective or efficient ?

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Principles for content in schools

• Match to the curriculum• Inclusion• Learner engagement• Innovative approaches• Effective learning• Formative assessment• Summative assessment• Coherence, consistency and transparency• Ease of use• Cost-effectiveness

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Activities on Collections• Create• Describe• Expose• Discover• Evaluate• Procurement• Resolution & Access control• Obtain• Gathering descriptive manifestations• Using• Local delete• Retract

Can we make them more effective or efficient ?

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Benefits Line of Argument

Enablers

Roles Enablers

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Enablers

• In a technological context when providing an IT system it includes often features of– Specifications– Tools and Services– Systems (i.e. systemic properties)

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Enablers

• METADATA:– LRE Standards and specifications for LRE

Metadata– The LRE application profile for ASPECT– Controlled multilingual vocabularies– Standards and specifications for Vocabularies

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Enablers

• EXCHANGE PROTOCOLS– Which: SQI,SRU,SRW, OAI-PMH, SPI– Features

• Allowing heterogeneity with respect to the exchange format (e.g. LOM or DC)

• Allowing heterogeneity with respect to query language• Support of a synchronous mode of operation• Support of an asynchronous mode of operation• Supporting a stateful implementation• Supporting a stateless implementation• Separation of authentication issues• Available implementation; e.g. REST, web services, etc.

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Enablers

• Query language– Which: CQL, PLQL, LRE-QL– Features

• The expressive power• Providing different levels of expressive power. • The difficulty to provide an implementation for the query

language • Domain independence• The level on which they operate. For example the

conceptual level or data structures.• Human readable

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Enablers• CONTENT FORMATS

– Which: MIME-types, SCORM, IMS-CC– Features

• LOM metadata• Content packaging• Tracking User• Questions• Sequencing• Discussions• Tools• Roles• Lesson Plans & Curricula• Digital Rights Management• Profiles

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Enablers

• IDENTIFIER SERVICE: FEATURES, FUNCTION & CAPABILITIES

– Persistent Identifiers– Handle and the DOI System– ASPECT Deployed System

• HTTP-based handle resolution services • The SIS service (i.e Simple Identifier Service) is a SOAP web

service. Exposes CRUD semantics for administering handles• The SIS service uses the Primary LHS Server• The SIS service stores metadata together with the handles

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Enablers

• STANDARDS AND SPECIFICATIONS FOR ACCESS CONTROL– May involve financial aspects – Holder may require the user to acknowledge a

particular type of license– ASPECT recommends Creative Commons– IMS CC authorisation scheme– ASPECT: open authorisation scheme that can be

profiled

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Enablers

• LRE SERVICE CENTRE : FEATURES, FUNCTIONS & CAPABILITIES– Automatic Metadata Translation– Automatic metadata generation– A vocabulary bank for education and the

application profile registry– Metadata and Vocabulary Transformer Service– Content Format Transformer Service

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Enablers• LRE INFRASTRUCTURE

– Collecting and exposing metadata• Features

– Collecting metadata is a recurring activity– The communication is synchronous or asynchronous– What triggers the collection activity (pull/push)

• Tools for metadata providers– Harvesting target– SQI web-service client– SQI over REST client– SRU client– SRW client– SPI server

• Tools for metadata brokers– Harvester– SQI web-service target– SQI over REST target– SRU server– SRW server– SPI target– Mass upload server– Brokerage system

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Enablers

• LRE INFRASTRUCTURE– Repositories and referatories

• MINOR, SCAM, Lucene, SOLR

– Enriching metadata• By experienced indexers• By end-users• By automated tools

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Enablers

• A COMPLIANCE TESTING SERVICE– For what

• Metadata• Content• Services

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Enablers• DISCOVERY AND EVALUATION BY END-USERS

– Search – Browse by subject, social tags, etc. – Faceted search– Filters– Relevance computation– Ratings and annotations– Social tagging– Social Bookmarking– Ranking and sorting– View details, thumbnails, and previews– Personalised search, browse, filters– Multilingualism– Alerts and other forms of selective dissemination of information– Social recommendations and other affinities– Selected collections

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Enablers

• LRE ACCESS CONTROL– Distribution models

• Open access, with no use restriction• Licensed access, NOT requiring that a license is

acknowledged by the user before use• Licensed access, requiring that a license is acknowledged by

the user before use• Credit-based access, requiring the payment in a virtual

currency before use – Access control protocol– Learning Object broker acts as a trusted third party– Using a controlled environment before accessing the

requested resource

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Enablers

• CONTENT PLAYERS/VIEWERS– Which

• Different MIME type viewers• SCORM player & Common cartridge player

– Feature• Web Browser compatibility• Supporting full specs

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ProviderBroker

User

Brokering Content

Author ProviderBroker

BrokerProviderBroker

ConsumerBroker

UserUser

UserAuthor UserUserContentGathering

ContentDelivery

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ProviderBroker

User

Brokering Metadata

Indexer ProviderBroker

BrokerProviderBroker

ConsumerBroker

UserUser

UserIndexer UserUser

ProfessionalsCasual Users- Annotations, bookmarks, ratings- LOMMachine- Object, context- Usage data- Language translationsOther brokers

MetadataGathering

MetadataExposure

Discovery- Search, browse, sort, refine- Browse (keywords, tags)- Social recommendationAlerts

Harvesting- REST- File transferFederated Search- Web services- RESTAlerts, publish

Own discovery toolsYour Widget

Harvesting-REST-File transferFederated Search-Web services-RESTAlerts, publish

RepositoryReferatoryQuery EnrichmentRegistry

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ProviderBroker

User

Brokering Collection Metadata

Indexer ProviderBroker

BrokerProviderBroker

ConsumerBroker

UserUser

UserIndexer UserUser

ProfessionalsCasual Users- Annotations, bookmarks, ratings- LOMMachine- Object, context- Usage data- Language translationsOther brokers

MetadataGathering

MetadataExposure

Discovery- Search, browse, sort, refine- Browse (keywords, tags)- Social recommendationAlerts

Harvesting- REST- File transferFederated Search- Web services- RESTAlerts, publish

Own discovery toolsYour Widget

Harvesting-REST-File transferFederated Search-Web services-RESTAlerts, publish

RegistryQuery EnrichmentRegistry

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BenefitsLine of

Argument

Line of Argument

Roles Enablers

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Establishing a Line of Argument

• Starting from enablers and their properties– I do X in order to …– This feature is important because …

• Starting from benefits– This benefit can be achieved by …

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• Bookmarking is important because– It is the basis for social recommendation

• Social recommendation is important because– Is this really true?– It is an effective and efficient way of discovery– This is a benefit for users

• Questions– Is there no better basis for social recommendation?– How many users would bookmark?– How many users would use social recommendation ?

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• We apply creative commons because– It facilitates access to free resources– This is a benefit for the user

• However this is a disbenefit to publishers

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Conclusion

• Benefits and dis-benefits can and should be elicited

• This can be done by– Understanding the stakeholder roles– The benefits of these roles– The enablers; in our case LT enablers– The line of reasoning between enablers and the

benefits

• Stakeholders’ involvement is essential for establishing the benefits

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Thank you

Questions

48