Linking research & learning technologies through standards

The Link Affiliates team in collaboration with e-Works are currently working on some schools-based e-learning content to explore emerging trends and influences affecting content. This work is part of the DEEWR funded Technical Standards for Digital Education project. There are two particular aspects to this work:

• Integration and use of collaborative Web 2.0 type technologies with e-learning content appropriate for use in Australian schools
• Exploring the potential impact and challenges for the Australian schools sector from the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 specification (for more information on WCAG 2.0, refer to Kristena Gladman’s recent post).

To facilitate this work, The Learning Federation has kindly provided us with small number of e-learning resources to work with.

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0

We will be modifying the content to align it with WCAG 2.0 guidelines to gain a practical understanding of what this entails and how this might differ from current best practice. Exploring what WCAG 2.0 means in practice to different types of content including Adobe Flash, and identifying the availability of WCAG 2.0 related implementation information and how useful this is to developers.

IMS Common Cartridge

The content will be packaged using the recent IMS Common Cartridge (IMS CC) specification, which is a method for packaging and deploying e-learning content. This specification has a few features we are planning to explore to embed collaborative services/functionality, and to facilitate access control. We are also wanting to determine how much practical software support exists for the IMS CC specification and what this means to users.

Outcomes

This content will be demonstrated to the Technical Standards for Digital Education project’s focus groups at a face to face meeting to coincide with the IDEA10 conference in mid March. We are hoping to also make some or all of this content publicly available pending copyright clearance soon after this demonstration.