Learning Environment Models

Composing your Learning Environment; new models
Led by Sheila MacNeill and Wilbert Kraan

The MLE concept first tackled the need to integrate functionality and data in teaching and learning IT systems. The PLE discussion radically re-conceptualised the notion of a learning environment for the social web apps age. But the VLE is still there, proving that it has a clear role in most educational institutions.

The resulting tension between the role of the VLE as a common tool for the institutional community on the one hand, and the desire to make it permeable to the wider web on the other has created a number of new solutions. These solutions are built on different architectures that each have their own strengths and weaknesses.

We will explore those strenghts and weaknesses in two sessions. This one will explore the user requirements for creating new/extending existing learning environments and will touch on the following models:


 * One system in the cloud, many outlets (e.g. common need)
 * Plug-ins to existing VLEs (e.g. Icodeon tools)
 * Many widgets from the web, into one VLE (e.g. Wookified Moodle)
 * The portable discussion: Wave
 * Mix and match (e.g. Sakai)