The Business of Digital Publishing by Hall Frania

Author:Hall, Frania...
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2013-10-30T11:24:40.850000+00:00

Technological developments in e-learning

Developments in technology are important here. Learning management systems (LMS) are the systems used by organisations for a variety of activities from managing student records to running distance learning programmes. Different organisations will use their LMS for different sorts of things; they do not necessarily have to encompass much learning material, though institutions may have a learning content management system (which tends to be a subset of an LMS), where the actual content used for a course may be held and/or published for students.

There are some standards that have been developed to take this into account when developing learning management systems. SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model), which emerged from Advanced Digital Learning Initiative, is a system that has been used to sequence material; it creates relationships between content that mean that the order in which the content is used is defined, creating a pathway for the learner; this can be particularly important where testing may take place, for instances in a self-learning environment, so the tests can be reasonably expected to test what the user has learnt so far. There are other uses and the critical aspect is that SCORM content can be delivered on any SCORM-compliant learning management system – so creating a level of compatibility across learning objects.

These technological developments are important for the development of more sophisticated products that tackle e-learning. Educational software producers create a lot of products of this sort but publishers are engaging with e-learning more and more as they develop and publish online assessment systems or more sophisticated online packages that can be integrated into a college LMS, for instance. For some publishers this is a particular area of focus as they protect themselves against declining print sales; for others it is a key part of a globalisation strategy where they can bring their material to new online learning markets around the world. The challenges of e-learning clearly affect both the schools and higher education market, but it is the latter where there is currently more activity. US publishers in particular are developing new approaches; this brings us back to the size and competitiveness of the market, which can engender high levels of investment.

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