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OCR for page 7
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In the last half-century, we have witnessed the birth and development of a
new era the information age. The era was ushered in by massive machines
that could process simple mathematical operations that have evolved into a
global network of technologies that can receive, process, share, and transmit
information for a variety of purposes. Information
technology (IT), the primary vehicle of the information ~
age, touches the lives of almost every person. TT has
transformed the modern workplace, is essential to the
basic mechanisms of the world economy, is pervasive ~
in the development of new knowledge and wealth, and >~
With each 3
technological advance, the potential of TT to transform our
lives further becomes even greater.
has launched an entirely new vernacular.
TT has also dramatically influenced our capacity to educate. TT tools are
increasingly being used to automate administrative systems in secondary and
higher education and to manage and assess courses. TT has made distance
learning and asynchronous education possible by eliminating co-location
requirements during the learning process. TT has also been used to link
communities of practice, libraries, and databases, providing access to
voluminous amounts of information that can be used by students to enhance
their studies and by educators to construct teaching modules and texts. Most
significantly, TT has led to tremendous advances in computing, simulation,
and visualization improving the teaching of advanced mathematics and
facilitating visual representations of complex concepts and principles.
Despite the obvious benefits of using TT, the application of TT in education has
been disorganized and uneven. Pockets of innovation in localized
environments are thriving but the promise of open access, greatly enhanced
teaching and learning, and large-scale use has not been realized.
07 — ~
7
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8
IT-Based Educational Materials: Workshop Report
The purpose of this National Academy of Engineering (NAE) initiative is to
realize the potential of TT-transformed science, technology, engineering, and
mathematics (STEM) education as tart of a vibrant, adaptive, educational
enterprise. An TT-transformed educational environment has potential
benefits for many disciplines, including engineering, the physical sciences,
social sciences, liberal arts, and humanities. However, the focus of this report
is on postsecondary STEM education. At the request of the KavIi Institute,
NAE established the Committee on Achieving Compatibility in TT-Based
Educational Materials to plan and implement a workshop on achieving broad
compatibility among TT-based educational materials. Tt was hoped that the
workshop would lead to a plan for the creation of a scalable framework and
infrastructure that would encourage synergy, enable interoperability, and
facilitate the dissemination of TT-enabled educational resources.
, ~ ,
Based on the discussions at the workshop and their own experiences, the
committee has developed a bold vision for an TT-transformed educational
environment and has recommended a plan for moving toward a realization of
that vision.
NAE sponsored a workshop to discuss the development of a plan to achieve
interoperabilibr for TT-enabled learning resources. The meeting was intended
to provide opportunities for collaboration and networking and to facilitate
discussions on the requirements for, benefits of, and challenges to achieving
broad compatibility and transferability of existing and future TT-based
educational materials in engineering and other STEM disciplines.
The workshop had three goals:
I. Describe factors that could impede the reuse and sharing of IT-enabled
learning materials.
a. Describe the environment (technical, organizational, and cultural)
necessary for the effective sharing of e-learning components.
3.
Identify strategies for realizing that environment and recommend
high-priority activities.
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Workshop on IT-Based Educational Materials
As a framework for discussion, the workshop
was organized around four categories that
affect the reuse, repurposing, and sharing of
TT-enabled learning materials: architecture;
technology and tools; content and pedagogy;
and organizational, cultural, and legal issues.
With these categories in mind, the committee
generated an agenda and framing questions to guide workshop activities.
- · - - The framing
9
Categories that adert the (~§85 `8P0`P05~0g'
and sharing ct Iearn~ng mater'als.
ARCHITECTURE
TECHNOLOGY & TOOLS
CONTENT ~ PEDIG0GY
& LEGAL ISSULS
lwenty-e~ght experts and leaders were ~nv~tecl to participate.
questions for each category are presented below.
Architecture. The workshop addressed several questions in this area. What
are the critical elements of an enabling architecture that can develop and
distribute educational resources? How should learning objects be modeled
and data be structured to achieve dynamic content? How can we ensure that
content can be personalized and adapted to users' needs and that authorship
can be traced and attributed? Can learner profiles be used to adapt resources
to individual styles of learning? How can assessment data be incorporated to
provide for continuous improvement? How can we ensure security,
interoperability, scalability, and maintainability? Will the separation of
content, display, and navigational functions make it easier to share resources?
Technology and To4~IsO In this area, the workshop focused on the impact
of: (~) emerging horizontal standards (e.g., XME, XSET, OWL, and the
semantic Web) and vertical standards (e.g., TMS, MathME, and ChemML) for
TT-enabled learning and (2) the management of rapid changes in
technology/tools. How might we migrate from an environment based on
(proprietary) legacy tools to a standards-based environment that promotes
interoperable systems? What are the requirements for the
development/authoring of tools that would enable rapid protolyping, ease of
maintenance, content adaptation, and collaborative development?
Content and Pedagogy. How can objectives-driven and outcomes-based
learning strategies be integrated into TT-enabled learning resources? How can
TT-enabled learning resources facilitate the adoption of and improve the
effectiveness of modern learning strategies, such as active, cooperative, and
problem-based learning? How can TT-enabled learning resources be
structured and documented to maximize the "sharability," reuse, and
repurposing of the materials?
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10
IT-Based Educational Materials: Workshop Report
Organ~zaltiona31, Cultural, and I~egalL ~S$ues4 . ~ __________7
organizational, and legal constraints that would limit the development of
reusable, sharable learning objects? How can teachers and organizations that
develop TT-enabled learning resources for open, unrestricted environments be
rewarded? How can mutually beneficial online communities of learners and
teachers be created? How can appropriate learning units (and outcomes) be
defined and embedded to guide users in a variety of learning environments?
Do network environments enhance or impede assessment? How can synergy,
discourse, and exchange conducive to building a sustainable commons of
quality educational resources be promoted? What are the preferred roles of
different sectors (education, industry, government), and how should they
interact?
What are the cultural.
RESULTS
Twenty-eight distinguished leaders in the development, use, and application
of TT-based educational materials for STEM education participated in the
workshop, which was held in Washington, D.C., on November 8, coon. The
workshop agenda and roster can be found in Appendixes A and B.
respectively. The workshop was onenec! with a statement of the charge to the
participants. _ O ~ ~
~ ~ . ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
1 1 0
P;ack~round presentations in each of the four categories
tarch~tecture; technology and tools; content and pedagogy; and cultural,
organizational, and legal issues) followed. Each presentation was followed by
open discussion to get a sense of the group's response to the issues raised.
During the afternoon session, participants were divided into small groups to
discuss specific concerns in each category and to suggest action plans to
address those concerns. Summaries of these breakout sessions can be found
in Appendix C.
In the final plenary discussion, reports of the breakout sessions were
reviewed, and participants attempted to come to a consensus. Several of the
important, often overlapping themes that emerged from the discussion are
summarized below:
Building on existing programs and increasing collaboration will be
critical to the long-term success of TT-based education. Building on
successful efforts (e.g., the Creative Commons) should be a priority.
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Workshop on IT-Based Educational Materials
11
A "national" strategy ~11 be important for allocating resources to
maximum effect.
Workshops or other types of meetings would provide a mechanism for
continuing the conversations begun during this workshop.
A national laboratory to facilitate the testing and sharing of TT-enabled
educational materials would provide momentum and an operating
framework for future development and would facilitate pilot programs
and test-beds for data collection and analysis.
A lead organization or "governing" entity will be important to the
development of a unified community and to encourage change.
Reforming cultural norms in STEM education will be critical. Reforms
could include addressing facula resistance to educational reform;
skepticism about the efficacy of educational reform; reducing faculty
resistance to the adoption of TT-based tools for teaching and learning;
encouraging faculty to place a higher value on sharing, team
orientation, and educational contributions.
In general, workshop participants agreed that the widespread use of TT-based
educational materials will require holistic approaches. The committee further
synthesized the discussion and developed a plan to move forward.
~ . ~ O ~ O
The steering committee met the following day to review the discussion and
develop succinct statements of the themes that emerged at the workshop.
Taking each of the workshop goals as a separate charge and pulling together
suggestions and concerns raised during the workshop, the committee outlined
a vision for an TT-transformed educational environment and recommended
first steps toward achieving that vision. The remainder of the report is
organized around three general categories that are closely related to (but not
identical to) the four discussion categories. The three categories are:
technology and tools infrastructure; content and pedagogy; and human,
cultural, and organizational issues. The holistic nature of the strategies are
reflected in the discussions and in the final recommendations.
OCR for page 12
learning materials: architecture; technology and tools; content and pedagogy;
and organizational, cultural, and legal issues. With these categories in mind,
the committee generated an agenda and framing questions to guide workshop
activities. Twenly-eight experts and leaders were invited to participate. The
framing questions for each category are presented below.
Architecture. The workshop addressed several questions in this area. What
are the critical elements of an enabling architecture that can develop and
distribute educational resources? How should learning objects be modeled
and data be structured to achieve dynamic content? How can we ensure that
content can be personalized and adapted to users' needs and that authorship
can be traced and attributed? Can learner profiles be used to adapt resources
to individual styles of learning? How can assessment data be incorporated to
provide for continuous improvement? How can we ensure security,
interoperability, scalability, and maintainability? Will the separation of
content, display, and navigational functions make it easier to share resources?
Technology and Tools. In this area, the workshop focused on the impact
of: (1) emerging horizontal standards (e.g., XME, XSET, OWL, and the
semantic Web) and vertical standards (e.g., TMS, MathME, and ChemML) for
IT-enabled learning and (2) the management of rapid changes in
technology/tools. How might we migrate from an environment based on
(proprietary) legacy tools to a standards-based environment that promotes
interoperable systems? What are the requirements for the
development/authoring of tools that would enable rapid prototyping, ease of
maintenance, content adaptation, and collaborative development?
Content and Pedagogy. How can objectives-driven and outcomes-based
learning strategies be integrated into TT-enabled learning resources? How can
IT-enabled learning resources facilitate the adoption of and improve the
12
Representative terms from entire chapter:
learning resources
