Information Security Warfare Systems - CTC Bremerton Instructional ...

ADL SCORM 2004 Demonstration: ISWS Course Conversion Lessons Learned
11. Content-free prototypes provide value by creating efficiencies in the development of new
sequencing strategies.
The project team decided to create a content-free prototype to test the SCORM 2004 manifest.
The addition of sequencing added a great deal of complexity and it was desirable to separate it
initially from the content. Thus, content-free placeholders were used in the initial versions of the
product.
The process turned out to be very practical and resulted in a number of efficiencies. First of all,
it allowed the developers to focus on the manifest without complications from the content. A
side effect was a reduction in the learning time for sequencing and navigation. Because the
content-free SCOs and Assets were simple html pages, there was also a significant reduction in
the development time required for testing and quality assurance. Once the content was added,
the testing and quality assurance time associated with the manifest increased dramatically.
The manifest is a reflection of the instructional design in the activity tree. That being noted, if an
organization develops sequencing models, the benefits of content-free prototypes would diminish
as bugs are worked out of the system. Those who choose to work with content-free prototypes
should also allow for sufficient testing of the product with the content, which can have its own
issues.
12. Instructional designers and developers can work in parallel.
Once the initial course structure is created, and the sequencing strategy defined, it’s possible for
instructional designers and developers to start working in parallel. For example, while
instructional designers are writing the content, developers can be developing the manifest and
creating and testing a content-free prototype.
13. Navigation is no longer entirely at the discretion of the development team, and
consideration must be taken to ensure learners have a satisfying experience.
SCORM 2004 has a significant impact on end users, compared to previous versions where
SCORM was relatively transparent to the learner. Historically, developers of computer-based
training have designed and controlled the way in which a learner navigates through a course.
With sequencing and SCORM 2004, much of the navigation is controlled by the LMS. SCORM
does not define how this is to be done, and so the same training may be displayed very
differently in different LMSs. It is reasonable to predict that navigational standards will be
developed in the future, but until that time, developers of SCORM conformant courses must pay
particular attention to navigational issues to ensure the learners both context and a smooth
navigational experience. If teams are developing to a known and familiar LMS(s), this could be
relatively simple. It will grow more complex as the number of LMSs to be designed for
increases, or when content must be designed but the LMS is unknown.
Conversion of pre-existing content may require a retrofit of navigation in order to prevent learner
confusion. An objective of this particular conversion was to minimize alterations to the original
content. This resulted in two navigational schemes: the one already incorporated into the SCOs,
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