ICOPER deliverable D-5.3 - ISURE: Usage of IMS-LD for Communication and Collaboration Services

The IMS Learning Design (IMS-LD) Specification offers a language for describing complex, multi-role oriented learning arrangements. IMS-LD places learning and teaching activities in the center of attention and thus goes beyond the mere description of learning material. However, IMS-LD offers just a small set of pre-specified services for collaboration and communication between participants of an IMS-LD Learning Opportunity. Thus, the question arises in how far the technical restrictions of IMS-LD’s service-definition have to be modified to include a wider range of collaboration and communication services while still maintaining the interoperability of the corresponding IMS-LD Learning Designs/Opportunities that was set out as one of the goals of standardization. Hence, the main objective of this ISURE (ICOPER Suitability Report for Better Practice) is to reveal whether and to which extent (new and changing) collaboration and communication services can be still integrated in standardised Learning Designs/Opportunities in order to benefit from reusability and interoperability even if there are only a few pre-specified services within the IMS-LD Specification available. However, instead of arbitrarily integrating collaboration and communication services into IMS-LD, the primary focus of this ISURE lies on: 1) The selection and application of best practice collaboration and communication services (here: combinatorial tool, forum, [micro-]blog, shared desktop environment as a kind of combinatorial tool, and wiki) in IMS-LD Learning Designs/Opportunities 2) An investigation of the ability of a) the IMS-LD Specification as well as b) corresponding IMS-LD editors and players to support such collaboration- and communication-intense Learning Designs/Opportunities considering particular requirements relevant to learning facilitators 1 Based on this approach, the following best practice collaboration and communication services are carved out: Combinatorial tool 2 , forum, [micro-]blog, shared desktop environment as a kind of combinatorial tool, and wiki. Furthermore, a comprehensive set of recommendations towards the following stakeholder groups is derived which serves as a first starting point for further elaborations on potential application profiles, respectively standard elements and tool developments to better integrate collaboration and communication services into the IMS-LD Specification as well as its corresponding tools: 1) Course designers/learning facilitators experienced in TEL in general, and IMS-LD in particular (see Chapter 3.2: Recommending best practice collaboration and communication services and their actual use in best practice IMS-LD editors and players) 2) Standardisation bodies (see Chapter 3.4: Recommending missing/new standard elements for potential application profiles of IMS-LD collaboration and communication services to realize a successful application of best practice collaboration and communication services considering learning facilitators’ requirements) 3) IMS-LD technology providers (see Chapter 3.4: Recommending how to modify IMS-LD editors and players to support these best practice collaboration and communication services) In particular, we recommend, amongst others, that there is a need to support a) communication, respectively synchronisation between (different) IMS-LD Learning Opportunities deployed in different runtime environments (RTE), b) a better integration of external tools or services into IMS-LD Learning Designs/Opportunities, c) the definition of “emerging roles” as well as the conception and design of more user-friendly IMS-LD editors and players. With a view to the ICOPER Reference Model (IRM), this ISURE is thus concerned with the following types of Shareable Educational Resources (SER): Learner, Learning Content, Learning Design, Learning Facilitator, Learning Method, Learning Opportunity, and Learning Tool. Thereby, this ISURE primarily contributes to the IRM data and guidance level. This is due to the fact that the recommendations for potential application profiles of IMS-LD collaboration/communication services to be derived in Chapter 3 primarily contribute to the IRM data level. Beyond, as Chapter 3 also recommends best practice collaboration and communication services and their actual use in best practice IMS-LD editors and players, this ISURE contributes to the IRM guidance level as well.