Providing Author-Defined State Data Storage to Learning Objects

Two major trends in eLearning are the shift from presentational towards activating learning objects and the shift from proprietary towards SCORM conformant delivery systems. In a large program on the design, development and use of digital learning material for food and biotechnology in higher education, a large amount of experience has been gained with regard to the possibilities of learning objects that induce students to be active. These learning objects are highly appreciated by both students and instructors. An important requirement for these learning objects is the need to support the storage, retrieval and sharing of state and history information that is defined by the author of the learning object. However, neither the current learning management systems nor the current SCORM standard provides adequate support for storing author-defined data. In this article, we discuss some of the problems related to the current learning management systems and the SCORM standard in supporting activating learning objects, and we propose a data model and a simple HTTP-based communication protocol as a solution to these problems. This article describes DBLink, a plugin that implements the proposed extensions.