It's strange concentrating now on learning objects. The last task involved reflection on assessment and the idea of, assessment-centred learning' became to be quite important in my thinking (Race, P. 2003; Anderson, T. 2004). It seems interesting to me today then- with the knowledge that assessment is quite possibly the single most important factor in driving learning- that with the new focus of learning objects and the discovery of a whole industry of commercial learning-products, there is very little available in the area of assessment objects.
I think this is probably worth considering at an undergraduate level of assessment, given the medical council requirements for standardisation of learning outcomes- since assessment drives learning, than wouldn't standardisation of assessment modules converge learning outcomes (e.g. USMLE - United States Medical Licensing Examination - http://www.usmle.org/)? But then I suppose the logistics of high quality, reliable, valid and transparent assessments (Race, P. 2003) become compromised with the scale on which this assessments must be made (~300 medical students per year, for six levels, throughout New Zealand each year).
Much of what is easily found on e-learning throughout the Internet seems to be on learning objects. I think there are a few reasons for this. Firstly, the Internet is a technological beast, and as such the techies (computer scientists and engineers) tend to have a lot more of a presence then other professionals- thus, the focus on e-learning standards, organisations etc. is on largely in respect to the technological factors, rather than on content or pedagogy.
Secondly, as alluded to in one of my previous posts, whether many of these learning objects recognise good pedagogy or not is overridden by the commercial forces driving uptake- both reduced cost for educational institutes and generation of profits by e-learning companies.
However, now onto my actual search.
Learning object search strategy and tips
1A. Which repositories did you visit, and what process/strategy did you use to locate an appropriate learning object?
I started off using the resources listed in the course guide. Following this, I searched using Google. I had originally written this reflection with the exact process, but on revision I think it's suffice to say that there just isn't the availability of resources for this course. Indeed, of the private/commercial learning objects such as IVIMEDS, they do not appear to have gone further than the pre-clinical sciences in an organ systems-based approach.
However, one of the learning objects I did find which was of note, was a learning object on paediatrics asthma, which gave license and author details and was actually pretty good, although it was largely didactic disease-based followed by case-based instruction. There appeared to be no standardised meta-data by which to search for the object within a repository. I found this object by searching for "pediatric (I used both pe- and pae-) learning objects" in google (http://www.google.com/search?q=pediatrics+learning+objects&rls=com.microsoft:en-nz:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7), followed the first link (http://www.gwumc.edu/healthsci/faculty_resources/health_science_learning_objects.cfm), and despite my previous comments, found this conveniently half-way down the page (http://learn.gwumc.edu/hscidist/LearningObjects/PediatricAsthma/index.htm).
But:
If you are unable to locate a satisfactory learning object, specify in detail your 'ideal' learning object for the learning task you had in mind.
So, my ideal learning object.
Taking the content of an 'Approach to...' topic (e.g. approach to fever in a child), I would use a narrative-based approach with a non-linear interface (storyteller approach), in order to create a PBL exercise. The technology would need to be cross-platform, web-browser based, light on resources, and amenable to visual niceties.
Therefore, the tool I would use to produce such a learning object would be:
The Flash Based RPG Game Engine (https://eduforge.org/projects/gameflashobjs/). This uses the Adobe Flash environment (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macromedia_Flash), the built-in Actionscript programming/scripting language (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ActionScript), a simple XML back-end file (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML), is quite simple to use and meets the aforementioned tech requirements.
Ideally, I would like to collate the story selection choices (i.e. MCQ results), and collate them for the class and tutor to see. The tutor would then be able to focus discussion on areas in which students' incorrect answers tended to cluster- I think this is where SCORM (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCORM) would come in, but this is beyond my technological understanding and skill- and I imagine would add considerable time and effort onto the production timetable.
I would also like to integrate a free-text box, so that descriptive answers could be submitted within the learning object environment and posted on the class discussion forum. The purpose of this would be to generate further discussion outside of the learning object environment, and thereby generate discussion around the differences in answers and the reasons underlying the differences (where they are significant).
1B. What tips would you offer to somebody else undertaking their own search?
I would advise them to prepare for a long and difficult search. I would advise them to start by searching for repositories, then searching within repositories. I would also advise them to search outside repositories, using google etc. There seems to be a lot of good learning objects which do not fit into a particular course or strategy, and do not comply with the learning object standards, but could reduce the time take in producing standards-based resources and could be ported relatively easily.
Linking learning object to learning objective(s)
2. What learning objective(s) will the learning object help your students achieve? How?
These learning objects will help satisfy the third learning outcome, as part of the professional, clinical and research skills domain:
Formulate logical problem lists for a range of paediatric patients.
- Develop a differential diagnosis list for a patient;
- Determine the most likely working diagnosis;
- Select appropriate tests that will confirm or alter the working diagnosis;
The problem-based learning exercises will specifically focus on diagnostic formulation, rather than on management issues- thereby satisfying the learning outcomes.
Access and copyright
3. If you did not locate an appropriate learning object, what were the access/re-use terms and conditions for one of the repositories you visited that you found notable?
For the pediatric asthma management learning object cited above the license was clearly linked to at the bottom. It used one of the Creative Commons licenses, "Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0".
I find the creative commons format of presenting licenses exceptional, especially given how often I stroll past EULAs/Copyright agreements/GPLs etc. without really taking any notice- simply because there has been almost no attempt made to make the license easily and quickly comprehendible by non-solicitors.
To quickly re-present what it says:
You are free:
- to Share — to copy, distribute and transmit the work
Under the following conditions:
Attribution. You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work).
Noncommercial. You may not use this work for commercial purposes.
No Derivative Works. You may not alter, transform, or build upon this work.
For any reuse or distribution, you must make clear to others the license terms of this work. The best way to do this is with a link to this web page.
Any of the above conditions can be waived if you get permission from the copyright holder.
Nothing in this license impairs or restricts the author's moral rights.
And proper attribution means:
...the proper way of accrediting your use of a work when you're making a verbatim use is: (1) to keep intact any copyright notices for the Work; (2) credit the author, licensor and/or other parties (such as a wiki or journal) in the manner they specify; (3) the title of the Work; and (4) the Uniform Resource Identifier for the work if specified by the author and/or licensor.
This means that my idea of deriving my own learning objects from the content in this learning object is technically out of the question. Having said that, once the object is broken down into its separate parts (i.e. content and presentation), I think it's difficult to establish that this work would be significantly original to justify it's licensing- having said that I'm not a lawyer, I don't have a clue about IP/copyright law, and the last thing I'd want to get involved in is a copyright dispute.
I have a couple of difficulties with the creative commons license- it is new, so the quirks in applying the license in practice may not be entirely worked out (perhaps as evidenced by the development of a replacement for this license- http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/. The changes are solely in the legal code section, i.e 2.0 cf 3.0, which probably just proves the saying, the devil's in the detail... For a summary of the changes between 2.0 and 3.0 see here: http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/7249. For more detail see: http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Version_3. Finally, for a good overview (in my opinion) of the whole CC affair, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_Commons_License- which is kind of fitting given that most (?all) wikipedia content is open-licensed, in some way, shape, or form: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Copyrights, largely on the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL).
Also, that although there is an adaptation for the license for Australia, there does not appear to be any work in progress to develop the license for official use in New Zealand. I find that kind of strange because there is extensive discussion about the document, including citation in New Zealand government discussion documents.
Finally, in my search through CC, I came across the discussion of an educational-specific license creation project which might be of interest: http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/3633.
Learning object integration/adaptation
4. How will you integrate the learning object into your course design? Can it be used exactly as is, or does it (or your course) require changes? Are changes permissible/realistic?
The learning object which I described previously would be integrated into the Clinical knowledge in paediatrics module.
The module as I described, would ideally be integrated as a unit within the LMS.
I think as discussed above that some of the changes are likely to be logistically difficult but nor unrealistic. However, it is likely that the changes would not be fully implemented.
Anticipation of positives and negatives
5. What knowledge, experience and attitudes of your particular student group do you anticipate might help or hinder the integration of your learning object? How can you best harness or overcome these factors?
These students are fairly tech savy. They are also fairly used to being spoon-fed with rote-based materials, with a focus on memorising details immediately prior to examinations. Thus, I think that it's reasonable to expect that some students may face difficulties with motivation and with milestones.
These students are also used to almost exclusively independent learning. The idea of being required to discuss the issues in a democratic way, may be challenging in this respect.
Finally, I think that students attitudes of e-learning will be fairly damaged. The reason I say this is that most of the existing use of learning technologies may appear to have been for the advantages to teachers and administrators, rather than for the pedagogical benefits.
I'm not really sure how these can be taken advantage of. I think the best way to overcome these factors is to design a clear, efficient and high quality learning environment, and thereby the reputation of the course be anticipated in a positive way. That sounds a bit idealistic on revision, but I think that other ways might help. I've found that during this course, that despite my difficulties with certain technicalities, the milestones have forced me to simply move-on (although I've submitted most of the assessments considerably late).
In terms of the knowledge of the students, I think this will be a positive feature. This students will have had at least 14 months of clinical exposure at this stage. They will understand some of the conventions of clinical practice, and diagnostic process. Thus, the narrative of the learning object will be intuitive. If it is not intuitive to all students- which would be surprising- then the environment itself would serve to further immerse them in this narrative process.
References
Anderson, T. (2004). Toward a theory of online learning. In T. Anderson & F. Falloumi (Eds.), Theory and practice of online learning (pp. 273-294). Athabasca (AB): Athabasca University.
Race, P. (2003). Why fix Assessment? – a discussion paper [Electronic Version], 9. Retrieved 14 May 2007 from http://www.scu.edu.au/services/tl/why_fix_assess.pdf.