Tin Can the Heart of ELearning

8/17/2019 Tin Can the Heart of ELearning

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“I could stay young and chipper and

I’d lock it with a zipper, if I only had a heart.”

Tin CanThe Heartof eLearning


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Tin CanThe Heart of eLearning

Table of Contents

What is Tin Can?

The Heart of Learning Design

Design Implications of the Tin Can API

• Truly Blended Solutions

• Curated Courses• Leveraging 70:20:10

Learning Beyond the Classroom and Course Paradigm

• Analytics & Big data

• Fresh Content

• Intellectual Property

• Personal Data Lockers

Users of Tin Can

Examples

Conclusion

References


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Tin Can, the Experience API, is the heart of eLearning design! The

technology can allow designers to create learning experiences that

are more organic, fluid and fun. The API or Application Programming

Interface has the potential to free the design of learning from constraints

of technology, context and a silo-mentality. Tin Can enabled eLearning

can converge diverse approaches, devices and contexts to deliver

transformative learning experiences - both for the learner and the sponsor

of learning.

Its capability to recognize and communicate learning - formal, informal,

social and collaborative - across platforms and devices as also offline

opens up immense possibilities for truly blended learning approaches that

can offer unshackled learning options to learners.

What is Tin Can?The Tin Can API is a web service that allows for statements of experience

(typically learning experiences, but they could be anything) to be

delivered to and stored securely in a Learning Record Store (LRS). LRSs

communicate with other LRSs and also with LMSs. From a learning design

perspective, the promise of Tin Can lies in the fact that it brings within the

ambit of learning those learning experiences that are not tracked by an

LMS or any formal learning intervention. This feature alone can radically

alter the learning design landscape. Tin Can is community-driven and free

to implement.

Source: www.tincanapi.com

“With Tin Can, the latest Khan Academy video can become atrackable learning event as soon as it is released.”


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How Does it Work?

People learn from interactions with other people, content, and beyond.

These actions can happen anywhere and signal an event where learning

could occur. All of these can be recorded with the Tin Can API.

The Tin Can API recognizes and records learning experiences by sending

secure statements in the form of “Noun, verb, object” or “I did this” to a

Learning Record Store (LRS). The LRS, which is a repository, records them

and shares them with other LRSs or LMSs as the case maybe. An LRS can

be standalone or exist within an LMS. The statements can be sent by any

enabled device with occasional connectivity.

The Tin Can API is the next generation of SCORM. One major difference

between SCORM and Tin Can is that while SCORM sends each datum as

a single API call, Tin Can groups data into statements, so much more data

is sent to the LRS in one go. This means sending a much smaller number of

API calls. One reason for this is that SCORM reports statuses and Tin Can

tends to report events. For example, in SCORM we tell the LMS whether or

not the learner has passed at a given point in time, whereas in Tin Can, we

report the event of the learner passing.

Top LMS Trend for 2014

“2014 will see a range of initiatives to address the needto quantify, track and share intdividual’s experiences inboth informal and formal learning.”

Source: 12 ELearning predictions for 2014. Edtech Europe.


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Tin Can presents an opportunity to create systems and components that

comprehend a novel format for experiential data. The Tin Can API has also

been built to support a distributed architecture, where statement streams

can be propagated to many places, and driven by many sources. Hooking

into streams of information already being produced by major learningbased vendors and applications could offer some interesting mash ups

and programming possibilities. The Tin Can API can offer real value in

areas completely unrelated to e-learning.


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The Heart of Learning Design

Tin Can has the potential of enabling designers to create and assemble

learning experiences that are more personal, interconnected and diverse.

The fact that one can track all kinds of learning - digital and otherwise - and

combine these in the design of learning experiences for institutions and

individuals, alters the paradigm of course design as we know it today. With

Tin Can, course design can truly and effectively blend online and offline

interventions. Also, context can be fluid, informal learning opportunities

can be harnessed and accounted for. Further, multiple devices, platforms

and delivery mechanisms can be used to deliver learning experiences thatdon’t just mimic real-life but are from and of life.

We all know that some learning scenarios work well face to face while

others can be more effective in an online medium. So, blended solutions

bridging the gap between the offline and the online worlds are always

welcome with educators and learners alike. However, the Experience API,

takes this concept more than a few notches ahead. Designers can not

only blend crafted and formal learning experiences but also those that

are informal, intentional, accidental and non-formal. The conversation is

no longer about reusability of silos of content created for formal learning

interventions. It is about putting the power of the internet and the real world

in the hands of a learning designer. So, the course design can move from

Open Learning Resources, Academia, Peer-to-Peer learning, one-on-one

interactions with a colleague to work portfolios, community projects or

collaborations in MOOC hangouts. It makes redundant concerns that some

fields of study, like Law for instance, do not lend themselves to eLearning.

The learning can happen across media, formats, instructional models and

delivery mechanisms.

Here are some design implications of the Tin Can API.

Truly Blended Solutions

eLearning is often criticized for being a simulated learning experience that

is somewhat divorced from real life. It is about real-life situations but lacks

an immediacy that a learning experience with peers can bring to the table.

While blended solutions do bridge this gap, the range of activities they

could select from was limited to those that can be tracked by an LMS.

With Tin Can there are limitless possibilities in how a learning experience

that answers to stringent learning objectives can be stringed together. Since

Tin Can is able to track any learning anywhere including not just formalface-to-face learning, but also informal and social learning, designers can

cherry pick the best quality resources wherever available.


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A relevant TED Talk, a workshop, interviews, shooting a short film, a

simulation or a capstone assignment can all be included when designing

or putting together a learning experience. Tin Can will allow these learning

activities to be closely woven together, interlinked and tracked in one

place. The instruction, the application and the assessment of learning can

alternate between the online and the offline world to best meet a set of

objectives.

Added to this, educators can more easily put together learning experiences

that bring out the interlinkages between fields of study rather than create

silo-based learning. The fact that you can reflect the real world in yourlearning will allow more scope for integrated curriculum design to create

holistic learning experiences.

Curated Courses

Courseware development has so far mostly been about creation of

content and its delivery. Tin Can enables the focus to move from creation

to curation and delivery. With an exponential increase in the volume of

information available online, content curation is gaining more and more

prominence. This means with Tin Can, designers can use open content

resources and other high quality, free online resources to create courses

and instruct learners. Educators and designers can use open content

initiatives, creative commons, Udacicty, Coursera, EdX, Wikieducator and

multiple other resources to put together content for their courses. This will

give the learners access to a variety of learning resources and formats

while in turn bringing down the costs of content creation in custom learningcourses.

I don’t have a resume!Check my Personal Data Locker, please!


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Leveraging 70:20:10

We are all learning, all the time. While talking to our peers, collaborating

on projects, discussing with colleagues and sharing ideas. Add to that the

fact that we are now connected all the time. And information is constantly

streaming to us. A TED Talk, a Khan’s academy lesson, an insightful

discussion, a game, a post shared and discussed on a social media site –

informal learning is happening 24x7.

McCall, Lombardo and Eichinger’s survey of high-performing managers

revealed that:

“Lessons learned by successful and effective managers are roughly:

• 70% from tough jobs

• 20% from people (mostly the boss)

• 10% from courses and reading”

Tin Can will can enable organizations to tap into this informal learning to

extend learning beyond the classroom and course paradigm.

Analytics and Big Data

In the e-learning context, big data refers to the data that is produced by

learners while interacting with the learning content. LMSs, CMSs and

other media, including social networks collect this data. The LRS will track

data beyond the LMSs. This can allow us to create truly adaptive and

personalized learning experiences.

Staying Current

Content within a course can stay fresh and current as educators and

designers can include a piece of content, a workshop or a recent Ted

talk in an instructional module as soon as it is available. With SCORM,

datedness of content has always been an issue. With Tin Can, educators

can update the course curriculum based on recent developments and

trends and learners can stay up-to-date.

Intellectual Property

Courseware development for universities faces significant constraintson account of copyright issues when it comes to sharing or embedding

content within a course, which is anyways available online. This includes


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articles, websites, YouTube links, etc. This content need not be embedded

within a course. Learners can be pointed to links and other resources and

while they view the content, the experience can be tracked and reported

back by the LRS as a learning event.

Personal Data Lockers

The ownership of learning will shift from institutions and organizations to

the learner. The recorded statements of learning are in the name of the

learner. Regardless of the context, the learning experience is stored as partof the learners experience. Learners can even have their own “personal

data lockers” with their learning information. Employees might very well

route possible employers and institutions to their personal data lockers to

assess their learning records. The learners can take their data with them

across institutions and organizations.

Who is Using Tin Can

In spite of the stated potential of the API, the adoption rates are not as

high as expected. People are still more comfortable with SCORM. It’s beenaround for a long time, they know it and have been using it. The stated

benefits of Tin Can are not yet evident to many and most people do not

know what it can do for them or how. There is also a perception that it is

disruptive and this causes a resistance as people are not sure how it can

fit in with their existing systems.

However, there is a group of pioneering companies and programmers who

are using the API in interesting ways. These and other applications can

also be incorporated in eLearning courses to track and share different

kinds of learning experiences.

Examples

• Tappestry a mobile app allows “users to enter Threads of information

that they have learned” and record them into a Tin Can LRS.

• Tin Can bookmarklet puts an “I Learned This” button in the browser

toolbar for recording the relevant learning events while browsing the

web.

• Book Scanner app (Android) can scan the barcode on a book.

• Articulate’s Storyline and Presenter products are Tin Can-enabled.


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• Lectora Version 11 and CourseMill LMS is slated to support the Tin

Can API.

• Roleplay’s scenario-based learning activities can now make Tin Can

statements that can be sent to one or more Learning Record Stores.

• Exam Builder has integrated the Tin Can API with their online test

creation application, Exam Builder. This application can issue Tin Can

statements to one or more Learning Record Stores.

• Blackboard is adding Tin Can support to its Learn platform so userscan import, launch and report on Tin Can content.

• Docebo Cloud supports the Tin Can API. Their Cloud LMS is able to

receive Tin Can statements through its built-in LRS, but users can also

upload their own Tin Can packages inside the LMS, and use them.

Go to http://tincanapi.com/adopters/ for more information in the gaming,

simulations, social learning, mobile apps, custom development and Web

Apps segments.

Conclusion

The API has the potential to transform the design of learning. However, this

will require not just new technologies but also a new mindset. Learning

professionals and the industry will need to work collaboratively to help

evolve this technology. Learning designers can take the lead by designing

and creating solutions that exploit the potential of this new technology for

the benefit of the learner, while simultaneously educating the clients about

what the API can do for them.

Reference

www.tincanapi.com

Documents

Tin Can the Heart of ELearning