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Learning activity Metadata was originally meant to be part of the scope for the Learning Design spec, but we soon realised that it would at least double the length of time/work involved in producing the spec, and whatever we put forward would be unlikely to get sufficient agreement from the IMS members for the whole spec to be approved - so we dropped it.

That still leaves a hole to be filled - whether by beach-loving folksonomists or by a more structured approach with broad(er) agreement. Actually the bottom-up/top-down approaches are complimentary. Especially when starting from scratch, people start inventing there own, usually partial, terminologies, and there is a process of merging and adjusting to gain a more comprehensive vocabulary and this is put forward for wider agreement which may result in specs and standards. These in turn get wider use which finds inadequacies, perhaps because the field is evolving, and the spec/standard needs to evolve to keep up (the LOM Education section, which should be its core, is a case in point where further development is needed).

Grainne's work is a great effort in bringing together a lot of emerging vocabularies (folksonomies) for describing learning activities. The next step, a hard one, is to provide some structure to the motley crew. They suggest three taxonomies, Context, Pedagogical Approach, and Task, as a basic way of organising them, and each has further subdivisions. They themselves are not satisfied with the structures and have invited comment. Agree or not, it is very useful to have it as a starting point for discussion. With an LD hat on it would be possible to include these in an LD Unit of Learning by using them as taxonomies in the LOM Classification section, as LOM, as in Content Packaging/SCORM, can be included at multiple points in LD.

There is a parallel effort going on in the JISC eLearning and Pedagogy Programme which Helen Beetham is concerned with.

There is also interesting work, now with a fair bit of practice based on it, at the University of Liege called 8 LEM (the 8 Learning Events Model) which proposes 8 Learner/Teacher engagements/activities which they feel is simple and (hope) is comprehensive in its coverage. They specifically wanted to keep it simple so that it could be easily learned and applied by teachers, so the underlying motive is similar to both of the last two, namely to suggest enhancements to practice where many teachers may typically be using only a subset. For more, see
http://www.unfold-project.net:8085/UNFOLD/providers_folder/providers_resources/LEM/
At the foot of the page there's a short 8LEM Overview doc and a .ppt for downloading.

Last November, I attempted a simple mapping of Grainne's Task/Task Description/Type into the 8 LEM Structure (attached if anyone is interested). This was based on a version of Grainne's work dated July 2004, so it is probably getting dated by now.

But, especially with the Southampton/Dundee/Intrallect Learning Activity Design Reference Model project as a potential focus, it's good time to open a full discussion between those who are expert on the pedagogy side and those who are expert in Classification/taxonomy construction to see if we can move this area forward.

Bill

Lorna Campbell wrote:
[log in to unmask]" type="cite">Hi there,

Very quick comment.....I think this discussion is very important and very timely.  I also think a joint Metadata SIG Meeting and Pedagogy Forum meeting would be an excellent place to start exploring some of the issues Sarah lists below in more depth.

Those of you who were at the EC SIG / Pedagogy Forum meeting on Friday would have heard Helen Beetham stressing our need for vocabularies to describe pedagogy and practice.   Helen and I have a phone meeting on Monday to discuss whether there is anything CETIS can do to help the Pedagogy Programme make some progress in researching and developing such vocabularies.  One development that  is likely to be of relevance here is the work of the Dialogue Plus project which Grianne presented briefly on Friday.

We'll keep you posted if we make any progress!

All the best
Lorna

On 9 Mar 2005, at 17:11, Sarah Currier wrote:

Well, the thought arose for me even before the CETIS Learning Design Workshop last Friday, because some of us are trying to put together a bid or bids for the JISC Repositories Programme, but it feels like the things we are wanting to do are equally relevant to the JISC Pedagogy Programme (is that what it's called?) - and this came up for me again after Helen Beetham's presentation last Friday about the Pedagogy Programme. It's a worry when you feel you may fall into a gap between two programmes. Also, that whole LD workshop was full of stuff which could conceivably be seen from a slightly different angle and become relevant to this SIG.

- what about using repositories to store and share learning designs?
- what metadata would you need?
- what about taxonomies and vocabularies describing pedagogy?
- how are repositories actually being embedded in teaching and learning to support learners?

It's all stuff we've touched on before, discussed before, I'm sure there will be interesting stuff at tomorrow's SIG meeting relating to this (particularly the DIDET project presentation). I'm just curious to see what would happen if you announced that one SIG meeting was going to be a joint Pedagogy/Metadata/Repositories meeting and built the agenda from there. I'm not sure if there will be many practical examples out there to present yet though- maybe by the end of the year?

Oh, my brain is getting really scrambled- sorry if that was a bit hard to read. Better go get some food.
Sarah

Phil Barker wrote:

Sarah Currier wrote:

Well, Phil, I put in my evaluation form at last week's CETIS
Pedagoagy/EC SIG meeting that it's about time we had a joint meeting of
the CETIS Metadata SIG and the CETIS Pedagogy Forum, for both
repositories and metadata issues! Whaddayareckonmate?

The thought had crossed my mind too... anyone with ideas for what we
metadataist might discuss with them pedagogists, let me know.

Phil.

-- 
Phil Barker                            Learning Technology Adviser
     ICBL, School of Mathematical and Computer Sciences
     Mountbatten Building, Heriot-Watt University,
     Edinburgh, EH14 4AS
     Tel: 0131 451 3278    Fax: 0131 451 3327
     Web: http://www.icbl.hw.ac.uk/~philb/



-- 
*******************************************
Ms. Sarah Currier
Librarian, Stòr Cùram Project
"A Storehouse of Learning Resources for Social Care"
Dept. of Social Work, University of Strathclyde
c/o: Centre for Academic Practice, University of Strathclyde
Graham Hills Building, 50 George Street
Glasgow G1 1QE, Scotland, United Kingdom
Web: http://www.storcuram.ac.uk/
Tel.: +44 (0)141 548 4573   Fax: +44 (0)141 553 2053
E-mail: [log in to unmask]   Mob.: +44 (0)7980 855 801
Stòr Cùram is Gaelic for Storehouse of Care
*******************************************


--
Lorna M. Campbell
Assistant Director, CETIS
University of Strathclyde
+44 (0)141 548 3072
http://www.cetis.ac.uk/ 


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