AFACTT Conference 2003
January 9 & 10,
2003
Simulations as Fundamental Learning Objects
Bruce L. Bird, Ph.D.
Learning Advancement Specialist
Anne Arundel Community CollegeOwner
MINDdrops.com
Introduction
The last eight years have demonstrated the impact technology can have on college teaching. Perhaps it is now an appropriate time to look at current trends in educational technology and suggest alternatives. My discussion will contrast the current "global" approach to what I propose as a more "local" approach for the creation and delivery of teaching materials. The "local" approach seems to me to offer a better way for faculty to maintain control over the content, style, method, and assessment of the teaching/learning process in their classes. Learning is fundamentally a "local" process.
Global - Learning Objects, Learning Standards, Databases
In the past few years various governmental and commercial organizations have been developing what are known as "learning standards" but are more accurately described as "learning technology standards". The goal of these standards is to make digital learning materials independent of platform, operating system, and authoring system, for example, teaching materials developed on a Macintosh - Linux system could run on a PC - Windows system. Links to the various groups involved in the development of these standards can be found at AACC's Center for the Advancement of Learning and Teaching web site ( Learning Standards ref 1).
Concurrent with the development of learning standards the concept and development of learning objects has become of increasing interest to teaching and training organizations. The definition of learning object tends to vary somewhat from author to author but essentially a learning object is a digital, re-useable, focused learning component. For example, in physics a learning object developed as part of the explanation of standing waves could be "reused" by a music instructor in a discussion of musical instruments. It is argued that over time as more and more learning objects become available on the internet this would reduce the time individual instructors would need to develop course materials. An extensive collection of links concerning learning objects can be found at the CALT web site ( Learning Objects ref 2 ).
From the global perspective once learning objects are produced then it is a natural step to store them in a database accessible to all over the internet. Links to several collections of teaching materials can be found at the CALT web site (Teaching Materials ref 3). It is up to the reader to explore these sites and decide whether these materials are true learning objects in the sense that they are re-useable, meaning that you would find them useful in your courses.
Local - Learning Objects, Learning Standards, Databases
By their very nature learning technology standards are global and are not subject to local control, however, local learning objects and local databases are under local control and offer some advantages over global resources.
From the perspective of a classroom teacher it is surprising that most of the discussion of learning objects focus on their re-usability but rarely mention what I believe of equal importance: customization. Can learning objects be easily customized by classroom teachers or instructional design teams to meet the teaching styles of individual faculty and the learning styles of individual students?
The development of locally customized learning objects stored in local (department, division, school) databases will produce an important academic resource. This local resource has the advantage over global resources in terms of accessibility, stability, and relevance to instructional goals.
One of the problems of dealing with teaching materials on the web ( a global resource) is that there is so much of it. Type any discipline related term into the search engine Google and you will find thousands of sites that contain relevant (or not so relevant) information that may (or may not) be useful for your teaching goal. Even with good searching technique your lucky if you can reduce the number of sites into the hundreds. If you manage to find some relevant teaching materials from an internet database, then the question of stability becomes a concern. If is available today, will it be available tomorrow? next year? the year after that?
Local databases of local customized learning objects are accessible, stable, and relevant. The relevance can be assured because faculty assessment of individual learning objects will, over time, identify those local learning objects that are most useful in their courses or with student tutoring.
Customized Learning Objects - some examples
I have established a web site, MINDdrops.com (ref 4) as a resource for students, faculty, instructional designers, and instructional programmers. At this site you will find some examples of learning objects that I have created with Macromedia Flash MX . In order to view these learning objects you will need the Flash MX player installed on your computer. (You probably already have the Flash 5 player on your machine. To upgrade to the Flash 6 player just go to Macromedia Flash Player Download Center (ref 5) and upgrade to the latest player.)
The first learning object example, Linear Kinematics (ref 6), consists of introductory text, a simulation showing three race cars moving in a straight line with differing velocities and accelerations, and an exit text. This basic structure, an HTML page with a Flash simulation embedded between text, makes this learning object customizable because the classroom teacher can easily change the introductory and exit text to match course requirements, student background, or teaching style.
In this example my introductory text consists of brief directions to run the simulation, a request for the student to record some general observations, and then some directions to record and print the cars motion including timing dots that will allow the student to take data and analyze the motion of the three cars. The exit text suggests some key words students could use in the search engine Google to find the relevant theory they will need to carry out the data analysis. In actual practice I suspect most teachers would want to expand the exit text to include a discussion of the data analysis required so that the student would not get "lost" on the web.
The next learning object example, Oscillating Bar (ref 7), has again a similar structure: introductory text, simulation, exit text. The student can set the initial angle of a rotating, oscillating bar. Then by using their watch he/she can take data which will allow them to determine the mathematical function that describes the bar's position as a function of time.
In the oscillating bar example I chose to give minimum introductory information in order to challenge the interested student. Other teachers would undoubtedly prefer to provide more detailed supporting information. Notice that the same simulation can support different levels of supporting text. This suggests that the simulation itself can be thought of as a more fundamental learning object than a learning object consisting of introductory text, simulation, and exit text because the simulation is more re-useable at several different levels of teaching.
There does not appear in the literature of learning objects to be much discussion of the classification of learning objects in terms of their ability to generate other learning objects of varying levels of difficulty. I suggest that this classification could be done based on their customizability.
Macromedia Flash MX is a very powerful authoring package for developing
teaching materials for the web. Other examples of teaching materials that I have
created using Flash that the reader may wish to explore are Reading Speed (ref 8), English
Grammar (ref 9), Unknown
Equations (ref 10), Maryland County
Quiz (ref 11). As these titles illustrate Flash can be used to create
teaching materials for most disciplines. Additional examples can be found
using the links at the CALT Examples (ref 12) web
page. Also, I will be adding more learning objects from time to time to
the MINDdrops.com Learning
Objects (ref 13) page so feel free to check them out and use them in your
classes.
Adapting to Change
Higher education has responded to the introduction of technology primarily by improving its technological infrastructure and developing its distance education programs. Perhaps it is time for a shift in emphasis from educational technology to education. Can we use technology to improve student learning at the interface where mind and ideas mingle? If we are to succeed at this, we need to explore, more deeply then we have thus far, changes in the role of faculty in higher education. These changes may require changes in the way higher education is organized and resources allocated. In particular, a much greater allocation of resources to instructional design teams, perhaps serving a consortium of colleges, would be a major step forward. If faculty are to maintain control of the academic side of higher education, then they must be willing to fully participate as members of instructional design teams. The accelerating change of educational technology makes this imperative if we are to meet our obligations to students.
URL List
1. http://www.aacc.cc.md.us/calt/learning_on_the_Web.htm#Learning%20Standards
2. http://www.aacc.cc.md.us/calt/learning_on_the_Web.htm#Learning%20Objects
3. http://www.aacc.cc.md.us/calt/teaching_section_b.htm#Teaching%20Materials
4. http://www.minddrops.com
5. www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/download.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash&P5_Language=English
6. http://www.minddrops.com/LearningObjects/Kinematics/mdlinearmotion.html
7. http://www.minddrops.com/LearningObjects/OscillatingBar/mdoscillatingbar050502.html
8. http://www.minddrops.com/LearningObjects/SpeedReading/mdreadingspeed062802.html
9. http://www.aacc.cc.md.us/calt/Flash5/Ex%2013/iqmod5english01t1e.html
10. http://www.aacc.cc.md.us/calt/ASP/MathTime/mathtime2.html
11. http://www.aacc.cc.md.us/calt/Flash5/Ex%209/iql9a.html
12. http://www.aacc.cc.md.us/calt/examples.htm
13. http://www.minddrops.com/LearningObjects/learningobjects.htm