Learning Objects Symposium Special Issue Guest Editorial

We are very proud to introduce this special issue of the Journal of Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia. The papers included are the best papers we received for a Symposium on Learning Objects that we organized in 2003, as a pre-conference Symposium to ED-MEDIA 2003 (Duval, Hodgins, Rehak, & Robson, 2003). The use of learning objects promises to increase the effectiveness of learning by making content more readily available, by reducing the cost and effort of producing quality content, and by allowing content to be more easily shared. However, the development and deployment of learning objects also present new challenges to designers of learning experiences and technology alike. For that reason, we took the initiative to organize this symposium to explore the benefits and challenges of learning objects. ********** THE INTRODUCTION Initial Observations From the original 51 submissions we received for the Symposium, this special issue includes nine reworked and extended papers. In the introduction to the Symposium proceedings (Duval, Hodgins, Rehak, & Robson, 2003), we mentioned that we were struck by a number of issues: * There is a diversity of contexts where learning objects are being employed. Even though most submissions referred to applications in academia (no doubt influenced by the overall EdMedia focus), we also received submissions that dealt with industrial and military training. As far as the domain is concerned, submissions addressed similarly varied themes, including sign language, mathematics, poetry, and Chinese. * Many groups seem to be grappling with issues that relate to the pedagogically sound use of learning objects. Few papers included clear guidelines or methodologies, or analyzed in any detail what had worked and how or why it worked. It seems as if there is more agreement on the nature and relevance of the questions than on approaches to making progress with answering these questions. * Similarly, quite a few papers devoted considerable space to a discussion of the exact definition or nature of learning objects as a concept. Authors often complained about the vague or fuzzy definition of learning objects, and then proceeded to give their own definition or interpretation. Our impression is that many of these attempts for a more precise definition are somewhat simplistic and that a more promising approach would be to develop a (set of) taxonomy(ies) for different kinds of learning objects or their components. In fact, this theme could be further developed into component architecture for learning objects (Duval & Hodgins, 2003). * There were a number of attempts to analyze, in an empirical way, how learning objects are being employed; this pleased us. Often, however, the analyses remained somewhat superficial. It is of course quite difficult to separate issues that are caused by the (not always very satisfactory) state of tools from those that relate to the context of use or from those that are inherent in the notion of learning objects itself. * Somewhat surprisingly, the number of papers that focused on technical interoperability issues was rather low. Possibly this reflects the somewhat less technical focus of the EdMedia context, or perhaps it suggests that this is not the area where the most pressing problems reside (anymore). Overall, as individuals who have been involved with some of the efforts related to the development of the learning objects paradigm, we are often struck and encouraged by the diversity of applications that people find for them. On the other hand, we are somewhat concerned by some of the misconceptions and over-hyped expectations that people project onto this field. A Side Note on Presentation Versus Dialogue One of the original goals for the Symposium was to emphasize dialogue, by putting more focus on discussion rather than presentation. This proved to be a key factor in the success of this event. …