LAMS V2
James Dalziel
Professor of Learning Technology, and Director,
Macquarie E-Learning Centre Of Excellence (MELCOE)
Macquarie University
james@melcoe.mq.edu.au
www.melcoe.mq.edu.au
Presentation for CETIS Pedagogic/ECSIG Conference, April 26th, 2007
Overview
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LAMS V2
Upcoming for V2.1
Pedagogic planners
Next steps
Author – Bedside manner sequence
Learner – Q&A – Collated answers
LAMS V2
• Over two years of work to rebuild LAMS based on all
the lessons (technical and pedagogical) learned to date
– V2 released December 2006, V2.0.2 is current version
– V2.1 planned for July 2007
• For educators and learners, the core concepts remain
the same, but many new features
• For programmers, it has a new modular architecture
– Separation of activity tools from “workflow” engine
– Easy integration of LAMS with VLE, portal, etc
• Provides a foundation for shared development for many
years to come
LAMS V2 – New Features
• General: LAMS V1 plus…
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Internationalisation (23 languages underway to date)
HTML editor for all activities (supports rich media)
All activities can be run online or “offline” (+ advice/docs)
New Welcome page for courses and course groups (eg, tutes)
New grouping options (teacher chosen, specify group size/no.)
New workflow gates (schedule, synchronise, permission)
Sequence launching using flexible groups; scheduling
Teacher participation in any activity; edit/hide/filter options
All activities provide statistics on student use
“Portfolio export” – downloadable record of student activities
Many more: See http://wiki.lamsfoundation.org/display/lams/LAMS+2.0+Feature+List
LAMS V2 – New Features
• Technical
– Ground-up rewrite
– Modular tools architecture + LAMS Tools Contract
• Supports tools developers and external tools (via wrappers)
• REST-style soa architecture for tools integration
– Server clustering for high scalability
– Flexible identity/roles management (inc. LDAP)
– LMS integration (single-sign-on; potential for tools via Contract)
• Moodle and Sakai released, Bb7 underway, Powerlink to come
– New “workspaces” provides file system for managing sequences
• (No more “sequence locking”)
– Monitor greatly enhanced, eg, all tools can be “Define Later”
– Support for multiple databases, multiple operating systems
– Customisable look and feel (skins, etc)
– IMS Learning Design Level A export option
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LAMS V2 Wiki (www.lamsfoundation.org/wiki) – Tools Contract
Upcoming for LAMS V2.1
• The LAMS V2 architecture provides the foundations for many new
features which are coming soon, eg:
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Branching
Conditionality
Advanced grouping
“Data in/data out” (initially quiz scores, more options to come)
Combinations of the above
• Also planned are:
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Live Edit (used to be called “Edit on the fly”)
Merge sequences (authoring)
Instant messaging
Pedagogic planner (didn’t make it for V2)
Dynamic joint classes for sequences (using Shibboleth federation)
Branching by group – different content for each group
Advanced grouping and branching – multiple pathways
Pedagogic Planners
• Some of the most exciting current work in Learning Design is
around the concept of a “pedagogic planner”
– A support process to assist educators in reflection, and selecting and
adapting sequence templates to improve student learning
– NB: It will be some time before we have rich enough libraries of
sequences that adaptation is not required
• We still have a great deal to learn about how to do this
• For me, a pedagogic planner has three stages:
(1) A decision process to select an appropriate template
(2) Easy authoring (only fill in essential fields)
(3) Output that can immediately be run (not a narrative description)
• The process needs to be easy to support rapid iterations
Early ideas for a pedagogic planner
An example of the first stage – Decision process
More details for the first stage – Decision process
Second stage – Easy authoring (other settings pre-configured)
Pedagogic Planners
• Stage 1 – Decision process – could be based on many different
models of reflecting on teaching and selecting a sequence
– My example – simple set of branched web pages
– Could be a search against a library based on criteria
– Could be based on recommendations, usage, etc
• Stage 2 – Easy authoring – assumes a template designer has
created existing sequences based on good pedagogy where most
features are pre-configured
– So the educator only needs to complete essential fields
• Stage 3 – Output can immediately be run
– Important for iterative testing, as well as easy sharing
– Narrative description in a text document is not sufficient (for me)
Pedagogic Planners
• A vision for pedagogic planners
– A model for using and creating pedagogic planners
– Software to support creating/using pedagogic planners
– Potential for re-use and sharing of pedagogic planners
themselves (incorporating decision process and/or templates)
– Iterative research on what types of pedagogic planners (decision
process and templates) are found to be most useful:
• Discipline-based?
• Pedagogic style?
• Delivery mode?
– I no longer want to build *the* LAMS pedagogic planner; I’d like
our community to work together to build lots of them!
(Stage 1)
(Stage 3)
(Stage 2)
Creating a Pedagogic Planner:
Educational Designer role
Designaaa
Design
Design
decision
decision
decision
process
process
process
Select template
via decision
process
Create
Create
Create
pre-configured
pre-configured
pre-configured
templates
templates
templates
Linkto/install
to/install
Link
to/install
Link
decisions&&&
decisions
decisions
templates
templates
templates
Fill in essential
content/tasks
Preview,
Iterate,
Run
(Share)
Using a Pedagogic Planner:
Teacher/Lecturer role
Optional:
Full editing
Next steps
• LAMS V2 Demo accounts at http://demo.lamscommunity.org/
– Full downloads from http://www.lamsfoundation.org/downloads/
• LAMS wiki for all technical documentation
– http://www.lamsfoundation.org/wiki/
• Educational/technical discussion & sequence sharing in LAMS
Community – http://www.lamscommunity.org
– 2000+ members, 83+ countries, 110+ sequences, 2500+ posts
• 2007 European LAMS Conference – 5th July at University of
Greenwich (+ training workshops on 6/7th)
– Presentation/paper proposals due by May 7th
– Pedagogic Planner Roundtable on July 6th at London Knowledge Lab
(closed event, please email me about attending)