A Review of TOPYX Elearning Solutions

e learning

I really think that elearning will never stop evolving because technology and society continue to evolve and change over time. One of the developments that I certainly find interesting is the use of Social Elearning. I think that developers hit the mark with this one because social networking is currently the top activity of people online. It is clever how they are able to integrate such a trend with teaching and learning strategies. One of the recently released elearning solutions for this is the TOPYX.

What I really like about Interactyx Limited’s TOPYX social elearning software as a service (SaaS) solution is that it integrates the social components we love from resources such as Facebook and LinkedIn and integrates all of it into a neat learning/training process. I think that Social elearning solutions such as these would really appeal to the internet users of today, who are greatly influenced by social networking sites online.

Other features that make it more appealing I think are its affordability and simplicity. It combines the traditional functionality of LMS (learning management system) with integrated social learning tools. It really made electronic online learning more collaborative and engaging—the resulting learning experience is definitely worth the investment.

I concur with the developing company’s claims that their new software is ideal for all environments. It can work well for settings from corporate, academic to non profit. As long as they’re in need of a way to increase collaboration, communication and participation while reducing overall costs, then TOPYX would be perfect for them.

I think that social elearning is taking the online education world by storm. I would not be surprised if more companies develop their own specific software for this latest trend because I am fairly certain that a lot of people will be interested to invest in such solutions, especially now with how the people of today allow themselves to be influenced by social networking and other similar applications online.

Alexander John.

Terminator and Elearning Software Solutions

I was just watching terminator movie marathon. I watched the first one until the fourth. It was a really good movie marathon. And it probably had a big effect on the tone and framework of this post about elearning software solutions. Yep, it most probably had a big effect indeed.

For those who were living under a rock these past few years or who have simply failed to watch television and movies for most of their natural lives unlike the rest of us normal (albeit television zombified people of the twenty first century) the story of the Terminator creates a large dent on this generation’s collective fear. We have now all become afraid of the future which in all probability will be overrun by robots possessed by artificial intelligence. Incidentally, a lot of other movies have this very same theme. The matrix is another good series that is based on the premise that robots and artificial intelligence will soon enslave if not eradicate humanity. It all stems with the further advancement of our daily activities to the point that everything is computerized – the automation of everything in our lives.

After watching the movie and cursing humanity or the U.S. military for ever inventing Skynet, I soon stumbled upon the concept of elearning. I was just looking for a way to beef up my resume by attending some classes when elearning software solutions came up on Google.

Naturally, I was horrified. They were essential automating school! We could now say goodbye to classrooms and teachers. What’s next? Are we soon going to attach our brains to a computer and live out virtual lives never having to leave our bio-support pods that feed us intravenously with nutrients, oxygen, and water?

Well, I hope I’m just over reacting. Anyway, elearning solutions seem to have a lot of advantages for busy people who would love to take courses without leaving the comfort of their home.

E-learning Software Solutions: Behind the Success of E-learning

I agree when people say that E-learning is the future of training and education. The direction of business, education, health care and government are all towards advancement in technology with reliance on the World Wide Web. This makes it truly inevitable for these industries to follow technological trends such as E-learning. With its popularity and advantages, it seems that E-learning is well on its way to the pinnacle of success.

I think it is therefore necessary to recognize the heroes who’re behind the glory that E-learning companies are currently enjoying. But who are these heroes? In my opinion, the different authors and programmers who developed E-learning software solutions are the ones who propelled E-learning to such great heights, and therefore deserve to be acknowledged.

E-learning software solutions are continuously updated by programmers to provide companies with cutting edge learning technology to oversee the smooth sailing of personal and organizational development, and to provide applications that encourage appropriate and effective learning and teaching approaches. These software solutions are crucial for the future of a lot of industries because it is unavoidable the learning in the coming years would be delivered and received through electronic means. The human element is not completely eliminated since these means are supported by people are who are knowledgeable about the programs and technology being used.

The service offered by E-learning through these different software solutions make content delivery flexible and consistent at any time, in any place, through an entirely innovatively exciting manner.
Thanks to these developers or programmers and their creative use of technology, the different software solutions are made available to the world. E-learning is thus given the ability to empower learners with independent learning and ease their struggle by its provision of efficiency and convenience. So hats off to the genius behind the success of E-learning, because with it, training and education would be as hassling as they were decades ago.

Check out Elearning Software Solutions for more info. :)

SCORM and the Learning Management System

What actually is SCORM?

SCORM, Shareable Content Object Reference Model, is a standard for web-based e-learning that has been developed to define communication between client-side content and a runtime environment. In the context of this article, the client-side content would be the course launched by a student and the runtime environment would be a Learning Management System. The SCORM standard has undergone several version releases from SCORM v1.0 in 1999 to the SCORM 2004 3rd Edition in 2006. The purpose of this article is to look in a little more detail at the communication flow between the LMS and a course that is SCORM v2.1 compliant. The intention is not to review every possible communication but just the main calls. We will look at SCORM in the context of a SCORM course, i.e. a course that has been developed and built to communicate with a Learning Management System using the SCORM standard.

First of all, let me define a few terms that I will use and that you may hear in reference to SCORM courses:

* API (Application Programming Interface)
The SCORM standard has a defined API. The term API is not unique to SCORM but is a well known term in application development. The SCORM API is a documented set of messages that are sent between the course and the LMS. The message may require a response so that the sender of the message is guaranteed that the message has been received and processed appropriately.
* Manifest
The manifest is the master file for the SCORM course that contains references to all other files that make up the complete content of the course.
* Single SCO
A single SCO is the most basic and most common form of a SCORM course. All files that make up the course, regardless of the number of lessons in the course, are packaged as one SCO unit. When the course is launched within the Learning Management System, it communicates with the SCO.
* Multiple SCO
A multiple SCO is where a group of files within the course can be treated as an individual SCO but packaged together with other SCOs to comprise one course. For example, the files that comprise each lesson of a SCORM course can be grouped together so that each lesson is a SCO in its own right and all the SCOs will comprise the one course.

Course Installation

For the course to be available in the Learning Management System, the SCORM package needs to be installed on the system. The method of installation will vary from LMS to LMS but will typically go through the following steps:

1. The manifest file will be located and interpreted.
2. The course identified in the manifest will be created in the Learning Management System and the course properties will be populated with the values defined in the manifest. These properties may include course name, creator, etc.
3. The lessons of the course will be created in the LMS and the lesson properties will be populated with the values defined in the manifest. Lesson properties would include information such as the path to the lesson file, passing grade, etc.

The Learning Management System should provide a facility to overwrite an already existing SCORM course so that if updates are made to the existing course, an installation will deploy those changes.
Course Communication

Initialization

When the course is launched within its run time environment, which for our purposes is the LMS, it will detect the existence of the API and attempt to make initial communication with the Learning Management System. This is a one-time handshake to ensure that communication has been established. The SCORM course is responsible for locating the API in the child browser session that it has launched in from the parent. The API is typically deployed using JavaScript. The API call that the course uses to do this is the LMSInitialize call. When the Learning Management System receives this API message call from the course, the LMS will initialize and respond to inform the course that communication has been established. An object model has been created in memory and the properties have been initialized to default values.

Intermediary Course Communication

Once the course has been launched and initialized with the LMS, the interaction between the two is determined by the course. It will use LMSGetValue and LMSSetValue API message calls to retrieve or populate data in the object model. Bear in mind that the object model exists in memory and has not been sent to the Learning Management System.

When the course needs to write the data so it exists in the database, it will send the API message LMSCommit. The LMSCommit will be received by the Learning Management System and the data stored to the LMS. The course developer will determine when an LMSCommit is required and it will be sent to the LMS when the event is activated. This could be at the end of each lesson or it could be at the end of the course.

The LMSCommit is an optional message and does not require a response from the Learning Management System.

Finalization

When the course is completed, it will send an LMSFinish API message to the LMS. This may be triggered by an event in the course that activates the LMSFinish or it may be on the Unload event of the HTML page when the user closes the browser. The LMSFinish indicates to the LMS that the user has ended the course and any further communication between the two will be rejected. The LMSFinish also initiates the Learning Management System to store any data that has been populated in the object model and complete the unloading of the course.

The key difference between the LMSCommit and LMSFinish API message calls is that the latter will prevent further communication with the course.

The LMSFinish is a mandatory message and does not require a response from the LMS.
Learning Management System Considerations

When the LMSFinish is received by the LMS, there are several scenarios that may need to be taken into account. Some of these may be the product of errors in course development but are scenarios that have been experienced in interfacing with a SCORM compliant course:

1. The SCORM course may indicate the student has failed a lesson but the score passed from the SCO may be greater than the lesson passing grade that was installed from the manifest.
2. The SCORM course may indicate a lesson status for the user and pass the score of the lesson but there has been no passing grade defined for the lesson.
3. It would be advantageous for the Learning Management System to provide API message logging so that a communication history may be recreated for debugging or historical purposes. Consideration should be given to the following:
1. Method of storage, whether it is stored in a database or out to a file.
2. Is logging on all the time or is there a switch to turn logging on or off? (There will be some overhead when logging is switched on, as opposed to being off.)
3. If logging is to file, is there a log file for each course, each user, or one large SCORM log file?
4. How is log data purged? When logging is stored in the database, how often is the table purged? Can the data be deleted or does it need to be archived? If logging is to a file, does the file build in size until it is manually renewed or does the logging mechanism have a trigger that automatically generates a new file? (If the file is left to grow too big, it becomes very impractical to open it in a text editor.)

Conclusions

SCORM has a proven track record in the web based e-learning world and is the accepted standard in the industry. Reputable LMS vendors should support your SCORM course out of the box. The SCORM 2004 version has added much more control and sequencing at a more granular level than SCORM v1.2 however those differences are significant enough to cause the user base to be slower in adopting the SCORM 2004 version.

Livening up E-Learning by Engaging Learners With Funny Quiz

Making good eLearning courses is a developing art. As a trainer, your goal is to make the training memorable. As you design the course, you must design not only the "what” (or content), but also the "how" (the delivery mechanisms). Integrate funny quiz (like "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire") into eLearning course is an easy way to capture the attention of learners and make your course memorable. Learners will interact with key concepts for your course quickly.

A funny quiz can energize almost any content and produce powerful new understanding for your learners. Funny quiz promote learning – more than revive tension, it creates opportunities for the learners to "interact" with the quiz so as to demonstrate learners' understanding of the course. Many benefits would funny quiz holds to course:
Funny quiz entertains learners with a purpose
Funny quiz gives learners valuable feedback
Funny quiz gives trainers feedback
Funny quiz motivates learners
Funny quiz accelerates learning process

So then, there comes into the question: how to integrate the right funny quiz into your course? Let's take a look at the following steps.

Step 1 - Identify your course objective.
Which objective you want your course to achieve after training, please take careful consideration. Specifically, what skills and knowledge do you want your learners take from your course. Then think about it how the funny quiz will help the learners meet the course objective.

Step 2 - Make course plan
After determining the objective, what you should do is making the lesson plan according to the course objective. Analyze and list the task you wish to cover in your course plan. Supposing you are going to explain the details about H1N1 flu in one course, you list would look something like this:
Course objective for H1N1 flu knowledge: learners will be able to master the details about H1N1 flu.
List what is H1N1 flu
List the Signs and symptoms about H1N1 flu.
Describe how to prevent H1N1 flu
From this list you will develop a set of task that to achieve your lesson objective. The next step is crux to import funny quiz to your lesson and enhance your course.

Step 3 - Choose the funny quiz for your lesson plan
The right funny quiz make a difference in motivate learners. Here are some criteria to select a right funny quiz:
Corresponding with the major lesson objective
Create an opportunity to practice skills
Challenge the learners intellectually
So, follow the criteria to select the right funny quiz. This will do as a Catalyst to help learners master the major point of your course.

Step 4 - Create funny quiz for your course
After choosing the right funny quiz, the following step is creating the funny quiz with the questions you have prepared. Which quiz tool you should choose? Quiz in Flash format instead of plain text quiz would really attract learners' attention, especially for eLearning course. Luckily, some quiz tool could help you create great-looking flash quizzes in minutes without programming skills, such as QuizCreator.

Step 5 - place the funny quiz in your course
Where the funny quiz should be in your course is also important. Generally, placing a funny quiz at the beginning of your course is a good way to take learners into your course. This starter quiz can establish a comfortable environment for learner. Learners will quickly access to the role of the course. On the other hand, you could integrate some outstanding questions into the funny quiz, these questions will cause learners to seek the solution in the course consciously.

The end of the course is a prime time to place the funny quiz. You can add some questions corresponding to the starter funny quiz. This will help you test whether the learners acquire the knowledge or not. If they acquire it, you could advance to the next lesson, and learners will have the feeling of success and be interesting about the next lesson. If don't, you could direct the learners to review the course.

Design eLearning course and apply funny quizzes to your eLearning courses. They'll make your courses better and help you be more productive.