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Usable and Accessible Made-to-Measure Learning Materials Magí Almirall · Muriel Garreta

Usable and Accessible Made-to-Measure Learning Materials Magí Almirall · Muriel Garreta Learning Technologies Universitat Oberta de Catalunya EDUCAUSE Mid-Atlantic Regional Conference 2006 Harborside Ballroom D, January 11, 11.45. The Open University of Catalonia (www.uoc.edu).

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Usable and Accessible Made-to-Measure Learning Materials Magí Almirall · Muriel Garreta

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  1. Usable and Accessible Made-to-Measure Learning Materials Magí Almirall · Muriel Garreta Learning Technologies Universitat Oberta de Catalunya EDUCAUSE Mid-Atlantic Regional Conference 2006 Harborside Ballroom D, January 11, 11.45

  2. The Open University of Catalonia (www.uoc.edu) • was created in 1995 • is a completely virtual campus • offers 19 official degrees, several graduate programs and post-graduate studies, and a doctoral degree, • has more than 35000 students and more than 1500 people including instructional designers, teachers, tutors, academic and technical staff • the Virtual Campus has up to 3.000 simultaneous logins

  3. Agenda • Introduction to the project • Problem • Solution • Process • Defining students’needs • Designing usable user interfaces • Making accessible output formats • Developing the automatic transformation engine • Results • Results regarding students’ satisfaction • Resulting output formats • Current and near future work • Q&A

  4. Introduction > The problem • UOC owns more than 1000 different learning materials • All materials were written specifically for e-learning purposes • Key inconvenience: modifying their interface in order to increase accessibility and usability was extremely costly and by no means automatic. • Develop a solution to easily publish learning contents in the formats that best fulfill students’ needs at each specific moment of their learning process.

  5. Introduction > The solution • The separation of the contents’ creation from their final format allows for an agile and cost-effective generation of several output formats to meet students’ needs. • The basis is an XML standard file from which different format outputs are generated automatically. • The output interface is designed using human-computer interaction (HCI) methodologies and following e-learning and accessibility standards.

  6. Introduction > The process • Steps taken to develop the solution • Define students’ needs • Design usable user interfaces for each format • Make output formats acessible • Develop the automatic transformation engine

  7. Agenda • Introduction to the project • Problem • Solution • Process • Defining students’ needs • Designing usable user interfaces • Making output formats accessible • Developing the automatic transformation engine • Results • Results regarding students’ satisfaction • Resulting output formats • Current and near future work • Q&A

  8. Defining students’ needs • Analyze existing UOC information to build personas • Persona: A fictional individual created to describe the typical user based on the user profile • Run a survey, focus groups and personal interviews to find out uses of learning materials • Define output formats

  9. Defining students’ needs

  10. Defining students’ needs • Results of the survey, focus groups and personal interviews • All students behave in similar ways towards the learning materials • All students use all output formats • The choice of the format is task and context-sensitive

  11. Agenda • Introduction to the project • Problem • Solution • Process • Defining students’needs • Designing usable user interfaces • Making output formats accessible • Developing the automatic transformation engine • Results • Results regarding students’ satisfaction • Resulting output formats • Current and near future work • Q&A

  12. Designing usable user interfaces • Iterative design through user testing • 10 users per iteration and format • Task-oriented test and short questionnaire

  13. Designing usable user interfaces HTML format: Evaluation of the framework New format Old format

  14. Designing usable user interfaces HTML format: Evaluaton of the information layout

  15. Agenda • Introduction to the project • Problem • Solution • Process • Defining students’needs • Designing usable user interfaces • Making output formats accessible • Developing the automatic transformation engine • Results • Results regarding students’ satisfaction • Resulting output formats • Current and near future work • Q&A

  16. Making output formats accessible • Content format for people with visual disabilities: Digital Talking Book DAISY FORMAT ( www.daisy.org) XML + MP3

  17. Making output formats accessible • Guides in Web format • Guides: Section 508 ( www.section508.gov) WAI AA ( www.w3c.org/WAI) • Automatic accessibility test: • Bobby (www.cast.org)

  18. Agenda • Introduction to the project • Problem • Solution • Process • Defining students’needs • Designing usable user interfaces • Making output formats accessible • Developing the automatic transformation engine • Results • Results regarding students’ satisfaction • Resulting output formats • Current and near future work • Q&A

  19. Developing the automatic transformation engine WRITING XML XML BASE Engine Engine Engine Engine PDF DVD HTML DAISY

  20. Developing the automatic transformation engine • Write XML • The author writes on a Word document • Editor rewrites in XML manually • Next year, automatic filters based in Word styles • Write in XML is similar than write in HTML

  21. Developing the automatic transformation engine • Base XML • Extended Markup Language • Logical, no physical language • “XML Schema” define the possibilities <?xml version="1.0" encoding="iso-8859-1"?> <!DOCTYPE modul SYSTEM "assignatura.dtd"> <modul> <title>Motivación y satisfacción</title> <code>90_862a</code> <autor type="m"> <name>Manuel Jordi López Mercadé</name> </autor> <introduccio> <title>Introducción</title> <p>Determinadas aportaciones de las personas, quizás las más importantes, no se compran con dinero. Sin duda, en la empresa y en sus equipos de trabajo la sola retribución económica no explica determinados logros y resultados.</p>

  22. Developing the automatic transformation engine • Generate web version: Transform with Extensible Style sheet Language (XSL) • Step 1: XML to SCORM • Create manifest SCORM • Create html content • Step 2: SCORM client and interface • Create menu • Create package • New line to write SCORM marks automatically

  23. Developing the automatic transformation engine Automatic transformation : Web version XML Manifest + html XSL 2 XSL 1

  24. Developing the automatic transformation engine • PDF version • Transform with FO (Formatting Objects) (http://xmlgraphics.apache.org/fop/) • Step 1: XML to FO • Special filter for your presentation • Step 2: FO to PDF • Standard and freeware software

  25. Developing the automatic transformation engine Automatic transformation : PDF version XML XSL 1 Formatting Objects FO Processor

  26. Developing the automatic transformation engine Transform to standard DAISY (http://www.daisy.org) • Step 1: XML to reading XML XML parts to read no logical information • Step 2: Reading XML to MP3 Use external program ( www.loquendo.com) • Step 3: Create DAISY standard files

  27. Developing the automatic transformation engine Digital Talking Book Loquendo xml,xml,xml ... XML xml,xml,xml ... MP3 DAISY

  28. Agenda • Introduction to the project • Problem • Solution • Process • Defining students’needs • Designing usable user interfaces • Making output formats accessible • Developing the automatic transformation engine • Results • Results regarding students’ satisfaction • Resulting output formats • Current and near future work • Q&A

  29. Results > Students’ satisfaction • The materials in the PDF and Web formats were used by more than 25000 students from September 2004 to July 2005. • This experience was done with a 1000 learning materials from the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC). • This adaptation of the output format to meet students’ needs resulted in an increase of their satisfaction. • General satisfaction of web materials? UP 11 points (63 to 74) • Web materials helps you to understand the skills? UP 5 points (69 to 75)

  30. Results > Resulting output formats • Web version in HTML • PDF A4 • MP3, DAISY • DVD • Pocket size, “Vull saber”

  31. Results > Lessons Learned • User studies are a good way to prioritize developments • Usability testing is the guide to design the UI • XML allows for the creation of quality edited books • The flexibility of XML and the accessibility orientation opened the door to unexpected formats • We can apply this development process and perspective to other projects > Open Source LMS

  32. Thank you! Questions and Answers Magí Almirall malmirall@uoc.edu Muriel Garreta murielgd@uoc.edu

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