Icodeon Platform Blog: October 2010

In 2009 the UK Government released a paper titled "The Learning Revolution" that stressed the value of semi-structured informal learning to complement institution based, curriculum driven formal education.

The paper accepted research showing that: unless learning includes informal rehearsal of formally acquired skills and knowledge, as much as 75% of the potential attainment could be lost.

The Icodeon Platform uses packages of premium, expert authored content to support both formal and informal learning.

Facial Expression Research (1862)

The following scenario describes a teacher's use of expert authored content deployed to the Icodeon Platform.

First, our teacher prepares for a short course on the Psychology of Facial Expressions.

The course is a blended learning course with some online learning and some class time.

Along with all other resources that the teacher assembles, a cartridge called "The Psychology of Faces" is uploaded to the Icodeon Platform.

Second, our teacher re-mixes the authoritative cartridge content with the class blog, along with other quality resources from the web, such as this article from Psychology Today. The resulting class blog might look like this.


Expert content re-mixed into blog

Third, the teacher re-mixes discussion material from the cartridge directly into student social networks (like this) so that the course content can continue to be discussed within each student's own social graph.

The class blog and the friends discussion represent opportunities for informal learning.

Finally, at the conclusion of the course, formal summative assessment can be achieved using the Icodeon Platform to deliver assessments to a school learning system.

Grades are securely returned from the Icodeon Platform to the learning system grade book.

The screen shots below show a rich media assessment hosted on the Icodeon Platform running in the popular Moodle learning system, along with resulting Moodle grade book:.

Secure assessment integration with IMS Basic LTI and Moodle

Secure results and outcomes integration using OAuth and Moodle

With a single cartridge deployed to the Icodeon Platform - expert, authoritative content has been blended with informal, social, personal and formal learning environments - and student grades have been securely returned to a school's own systems.

For more on educational scenarios that use cloud hosted apps and content, see the European Union iTEC Project.

For more on learning platform integration using Basic LTI and Simple Outcomes, see IMS Global Learning Consortium at Educause 2010 and the press release here.

The final two screen shots show the same cartridge assessment, still hosted on the Icodeon Platform, but this time launched in the SAKAI learning management system. Assessment outcomes are securely sent from the Icodeon Platform to the SAKAI grade book: