|
A learning object is
‘any digital resource that can be reused to support learning’.
(Wiley,
D.A. 2000, Connecting learning objects to instructional
design theory: A definition, a metaphor, and a taxonomy. Retrieved
January 19, 2004, from
http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/CIE/AOP/LO_what.html)
Learning objects are:
-
smaller units of learning
-
reusable
-
able to be aggregated or sequenced
-
tagged with metadata so that they can
be easily found by a search
(Adapted from: Wisconsin Online Resource Center. (n.d.). What are
learning objects? Retrieved January 19, 2004, from
http://www.wisc-online.com/Info/FIPSE%20-%20What%20is%20a%20Learning%20Object.htm)
Learning objects can be used in
face-to-face classrooms and in online learning situations.
What advantages do
learning objects bring?
Learning objects have a number of
advantages including:
-
economic
– useful resources can be shared and reused by students and educators
all over the globe
-
flexibility
– the same learning object can be used in many different ways, in
different learning contexts, within different curriculum frameworks and
even for completely different learning purposes
-
customisation
– the context around the learning
object, and often the learning object itself, can be customised by each
user to suit their needs (eg literacy levels, focus of inquiry, level of
expertise in the content, take into account prior learning etc)
-
give the users experiences
that they could not access because of the nature of the experience
- e.g. real life problem solving situations that students cannot easily
access, science experiments that may be too dangerous or expensive,
experiments that might need to be carried out over a long time frame,
variables/conditions in experiments that can be set and controlled
easily, resources that cannot be accessed easily can be brought
together, etcetera
-
high quality resources
– using multimedia allows for simulations, animations or use of video
and sound to improve the quality of the learning experience offered to
students
-
access
– students and teachers can access
resources from many different places, at different times and for their
own purposes e.g. for problem-solving, consolidation of a skill
etcetera.
This means that learning objects can be
anything from a PDF or Word documents to complex multimedia simulations
and learning sequences that use, for example, video and audio. They can
include:
-
tools - something which allows
students to create something new eg an application that allows a student
to prepare a graph
-
instructional objects
- a
'tutorial' that provides guidance on how to do something eg an
application that demonstrates how to graph and how a graph might be used
-
exploration objects
- something
that allows students to explore an idea or concept eg an object that
allowed students to explore how data looks when presented in different
ways
-
problem-solving objects -
something that might combine elements of each of the other types of
objects described above with a context for using them eg an
environmental simulation in which students are confronted with a
problem, take some environmental measurements, collect and graph a range
of data and use that data to solve the initial problem.
|
