Learning Object Repositories in Canadian Post-Secondary Education

1. Learning Object Repositories in Canadian Post-Secondary Education Norm Friesen norm@netera.ca National Library of Canada November, 2002

2. Outline - What are: • Learning Objects • Learning Object Repositories • LOR projects underway internationally • LOR projects underway in Canada: the EduSource Project

3. What are Learning Objects? • Any digital resource that can be reused for the purposes of teaching and learning. • Why learning objects? "stand-alone applications are incompatible with typical production, distribution, and usage patterns for educational software." J. Roschelle, et.al.

4. What are Learning Objects? • Reusable • Modular • Free and at cost • Flexible • Portable • Interoperable • Annotation, adding value

5. What are Learning Object Repositories? A collection of digital assets and/or meta-data accessible without prior knowledge of the repository’s structure through a interoperable functionsvia a network. • Adapted from IMS Digital Repositories Interoperability Specification • Assets and metadata can be separate • To prevent "silos" or "stovepipes"

6. What are Learning Object Repositories?

7. What are Learning Object Repositories? • Separate resources and metadata allow for multiple and disparate resource collections to appear as one • Metadata must be freely available • Combined in a single search set for single-click access • Provides a personalized, “portal” solution for the data access problems of the Internet

8. Educational Portal: SHARED & AGGREGATED METADATA • Educational Portal Search Results: • Movie • Animation • Website commercial repository metadata public repository metadata objects object World Wide Web object object Figure 2: Repository Types and their interrelation What are Learning Object Repositories?

9. What are Learning Object Repositories?

10. What are Digital Repositories • Gather/Expose: OAI Metadata Harvesting • Search/Expose: SOAP with XQuery, Z39.50 (SRW/SRU) • Request/Deliver, Submit/Store: FTP, Content Packaging

11. LOR's underway Internationally • COLIS project in Australia • JISC Information Environment (UK) • MERLOT • Universal Brokerage Platform

12. XML LOM Metadata CP Z39.50 OAI Server LOM Metadata Search Intermediary OAI Harvest SRW Server SRU LOM Metadata OAI Server OAI Harvest InfoSeefer Z39.50 Z39.50 E-Reserve DC+ext Metadata XML LOR's Internationally: COLIS Library Catalogues Web Content

13. JISC Info. Environment Content providers Provisionlayer Shared services Authentication Fusionlayer Authorisation Broker/Aggregator Broker/Aggregator Collect’n Desc Service Desc Portal Portal Portal Presentationlayer Resolver Inst’n Profile End-user

14. Universal Brokerage Platform

15. LOR's underway Internationally

16. LOR projects underway in Canada: POOL Project • Portal for Online Objects in Learning • P2P and RDF – cooperating with Edutella • Based on the JXTA P2P protocol • Splash, Pond, Pool repository “nodes” • www.edusplash.net

17. POOL: Peer-to-Peer

18. Splash Interface

19. LOR projects underway in Canada: BELLE-CAREO • Broadband-Enabled Lifelong Learning Environment • Campus Alberta Repository of Educational Objects • Repository with a client-server architecture • Metadata store; objects store is both central and distributed • Using content packaging to provide a way of exchanging and accessing parts of aggregate objects • +2500 objects

20. LOR projects underway in Canada:CAREO/ALOHA • CAREO: Web portal of repositories • ALOHA: Java client for metadata creation and cross-repository searching • 3000 learning objects

21. www.careo.org

22. aloha.netera.ca

23. Presented by: Norm Friesen norm@netera.ca National Library of CanadaNovember 20, 2002

24. What is eduSource? • eduSource will: • Create a testbed of linked and interoperable learning object repositories across Canada • Provide a forum for the ongoing development of the associated tools, systems, protocols and practices that will support such an infrastructure

25. The Facts • Start Date: July 1, 2002 • Completion Date: March 31,2004 • Total Budget: $9.4 million • CANARIE Contribution: $4.25 million

26. What will eduSource do? • Be based on national and international standards • Be fully bilingual • Be accessible to all Canadian including those with disabilities through its work with the TILE (The Inclusive Learning Exchange) project • Share and disseminate its findings with all of Canada

27. What won’t eduSource do? • NOT a 24/7 production-quality network - it’s a research project about designing, building and evaluating prototypes • NOT about developing content - it’s about linking and repurposing existing content • NOT restricted to broadband networks - most of its content is accessible over all networks

28. Athabasca Univ. Netera NewMIC Technologies Cogigraph Univ. of Waterloo Tele Education NB Primary Partners

29. Athabasca Univ. Univ. of British Columbia Univ. de Montréal Univ. of Alberta Brock Univ. NAIT Univ. de Laval Sheridan College Univ. de Moncton BCIT Netera Univ. of Calgary Technologies Cogigraph Univ. of Waterloo C2T2 TENB ETI APCCC Seneca College Simon Fraser Univ. Univ. of Lethbridge Ecole Polytechnique NBDEN Academic Partners NewMIC

30. Athabasca Univ. TeleSat Télé- université Alberta Learning CANARIE NRC Netera Technologies Cogigraph Univ. of Waterloo Rights Market TENB Teles Training Callisto Bell Technomedia e-com Industrial & Government Partners Antarcti.ca NewMIC

31. eduSource Work Packages • Repository Content Development Facilitation • Digital Rights Management • Testing and Evaluation • Metadata Development • Software Development • Hardware Integration • Business and Management Models • Community Building • Project Management, Co-ordination and Communications

32. Repository Content Development Facilitation Metadata Development Software Development (Learning Commons, U of C; Athabasca) Hardware Integration Digital Rights Management Technical Group

33. Evaluation and Testing (ATL, U of A) Business & Management Models Project Management, Coordination, Communica- tions Community Building Communications Group

34. Management Committee Vision Group Evaluation and Testing Repository Content Development Facilitation Project Management, Coordination, Communica- tions Metadata Develop- ment Business & Management Models Software Development Hardware Integration Community Building Digital Rights Management Overall Structure

35. Rights Mgmt. Tagging Tools 3rd Party Add-ons Modular Software Components Open Systems Specifications Search Engines User Interfaces Repository in a Box National/International Standards and Practices

37. The eduSource Team • Close to 100 individuals including: • 1 software architect • 2 software analysts • 4 information architects • 5 designers • 17 researchers • 22 programmers • 22 faculty development coordinators

38. eduSource Guiding Principles • Open systems • Common standards • Interoperability • Stakeholder input and community building are essential

39. Thank You • For further information please visit: www.edusource. ca Or contact: Douglas MacLeod, Director of Projects Netera Alliance (403) 609-3642 dmacleod@netera.ca