E-Learning Strategy for the Cluster

The introduction of e-learning scenarios in the 'Future Ocean' cluster is a challenge for three reasons:

  • The course offers within cluster are manifold, including the ISOS Phd Course Programme, three complete master study programmes as well as many other courses from different disciplines and faculties.
  • Compared to the number of courses, there are only few resources available to support extensive e-learning services for each course.
  • The majority of cluster lecturers face the challenge of having little experience in using e-learning for their courses as well as few resources (time & money) to get familiar with the potentials e-learning provides them.

The question is where to start? A promising first approach is to produce educational add-ons to extend existing learning resources with dynamic and interactive e-content on a course-by-course basis. Complete e-courses are evolving in time based on existing material rather having been designed from scratch. E-content is getting increasingly complex by adding dynamic and interactive media and, hence, adding educational value.

The extension strategy primarily benefits from six different categories in media use, being ranked below in corresponding steps of increasing production complexity (the crucial realization measure). The educational value of each category as well as of category combinations heavily depends on the learning subject and, hence, has to be decided individually by authors.

Detailed information on each category is given below (click on one step within the image and a popup with detailed description will appear).

The ISOS e-learning group will support any activity on any level. How to accomplish for an efficient e-content production in small expert teams can be read in production.

See our e-learning project list for some examples. All projects are classified according to the step colour scheme above.


Step 1 By collecting existing digital material (lecture slides, practical course scripts, dynamic and interactive media), a basis is layed out for a fast access to relevant materials by students. On this level, lectureres make first experiences with the functionality and benefits of our e-learning platform. This process (as well as the following) will be accompanied by peridocally trainings (see section Services).

Step 2 In a second step, interactive assignments for student self-testing can be created, which allow for a continuous reflection on learning contents and, in parallel, asure a matching between learners knowledge and intended educational objective. Step 2 can be achieved with relatively little effort, since lectures usually have a pool of questions and answers. Since Nickels provides several test-types (multiple choice, sort, order, map, image map, etc. - see our online tutorial for details), the integration of own tests into Nickels can be done by a student assistants. ISOS funds and supports short period student assistance (see Production).

Step 3 The third step introduces the learner as author. Learner permanently produce content for courses, being it lecture summaries for their own use, homework, talks or protocols. Beyond that, working in groups is common for students, self-organized or determined by the course structure (e.g. practical courses). Usually, learners' content is viewed and evaluated by tutors only - fellow students only rarely participate.
These authoring processes can be supported by modern technologies, i.e. by Web 2.0 tools (definition), to promote participative learning. Content is not only written, but shared, commented and reviewed by other learners, e.g. via discussion forum and weblog. Additionally, some tools support the content production in groups, i.e. in wikis, where every user can write (and rewrite) a given text.
Introducing these tools in education means allowing (and forcing) students to write content, that is (re-)viewed not only tutors but by the whole group of fellow students. This might raise the motivation for learners to produce high quality content.
For ocean sciences education this means sharing data, texts and graphics and therewith, producing additional content for learning, a high quality of learners content provided.

Step 4 The introduction of dynamic media in step 4, like animations or audio and video files, goes a step further in the e-content domain and makes use of media, that are hardly to provide usefully in other forms than over the computer (i.e. the internet). Dynamic media can account for three major educational domains in ocean sciences:
Firstly, instructional films for experimental setups in practical courses and secondly, animation of complex processes. Both types demand professional skills, like scripting, filming, speaking in the case of video production or professional drawing in the case of animation. Hence, the production of this type of media does not depend on the lectures and assistants alone, but requires external help.
A third type are dynamic visualizations derived from scientific data, as they are widely used in ocean sciences as explanatory tool.

Step 5 Interactive media represent the most valuable type of e-learning component, since they put the learner in the center of the learning process. The learner is not merely receptive, but rather forced to actively explore learning content - otherwise nothing will happen. Hence, they do not only provide declarative knowledge (know that) but also procedural knowledge (know how). Three types of interactive media are useful for ocean sciences:
(1) interactive animations, (2) numerical simulations, (3) scientific software (simulation tools, data bases).
In natural sciences, the use of interactive media is very common in form of experimental setups in practical courses. Even though brought to students in the real world, they are an interactive medium to learn the procedure of scientific working exemplified by a specific problem and method.
The same is true for computer based interactive media, i.e. for interactive simulations: they convey procedural knowledge of how to handle and explore a simulation and declarative knowledge about the specific subject as well as about the role of simulation in science.
Obviously, ocean sciences teaching can benefit from the use of educational simulation, since they are not only an illustrative and explorable medium to convey the behaviour of complex systems but they are an essential method for ocean sciences research.

Both, step 4 and step 5, require much more effort in time and financial resources than the previous levels, but in return gain a high educational value. To accomplish an easy production of dynamic and interactive media, the ISOS e-learning group pursues an approach of collecting and developing general tools for an easy production of dynamic and interactive media - our pilot on an educational simulation framework is one example for a general approach.

Step 6 An e-learning course is a hypermedial text structure containing media types from at least two of the previous levels including some standard communication channels. Hence, after having produced some supplementary dynamic or interactive media for your course, the last step is to make the provided download material (step 1) explicit, that is structure and rewrite bullet lists into readable sections and include extended comments for the graphics used - and to integrate the previously produced e-learning components.


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