In SCORM, an activity tree is the
prescription for how to deliver a SCORM package to a user.
It specifies at least one activity. Any activity may itself
consist of sub-activities. Sequencing rules may be attached
to the activity tree. An activity that has sub-activities
is delivered to the user by delivering its sub-activities.
An activitity that has sub-activities is delivered to the
user by launching a launchable
resource. The activity tree is defined in the
manifest file in a SCORM package.
Aviation Industry CBT Committee. CBT stands for Computer Based Instruction.
The AICC was formed by the aviation industry to developed the first interoperability
recommendations for computer-based learning content,
precursors to the current SCORMspecifications. Several of the IEEE learning technology
standards are based in part on earlier AICC specifications. The AICC is still
developing and promoting standards of particular interest to the aviation industry.
Web site: http://www.aicc.org.
API
Application Programming Interface. A well specified
software component that allows one software component to
talk to another one, even if they are not developed by the
same people, and without knowing the details of how the
other component is implemented. In SCORM,
the API is specified in two main parts:
(1) The communication API specification, which specifies how a SCO finds an API object provided
by the runtime environment that delivers the content
and communicates with that API object, and (2) the data model specification, that
specifies which data can be communicated between the SCO and the RTE. SCORM specifies two data models for communication. The main data model is used for tracking of learning information and the other is used for some navigation related data. The communication API and
the main data model, which SCORM calls the "CMI" data model, are defined by
IEEE standards.
The additional data model used to
communicate navigation related information is specific to SCORM.
API Object
Also sometimes called "API Instance", this is an ECMAScript
compatible software object provided by
a SCORM runtime environment in a Web browser so that SCORM content
can communicate with the LMS that will track
the results of using the content.
Aptitude
A natural ability to learn or to perform a task or a function. Sometimes synonymous with competency, although aptitude is used more often in reference to innate abilities and the ability to learn, while competencies are used more often in reference to abilities that can be developed through education or training. See also competency.
Assessment
This term has two common
meanings in learning and performance: (a) The process by which an individual or group's aptitude, competence, or specific competencies such as defined skills, knowledge or attitudes are evaluated; (b) a printed or electronic resource (e.g. a Learning Object) used as the instrument to perform an assessment. In practice, an assessment process can be very informal or very formal; it can take seconds or it can take years. See also aptitude, competence, competency, Learning Object.
Asset
In the SCORMspecifications this term has two common
meanings: (a) A resource
element that may itself be dependent on many assets;
(b) a file, in other words an atomic asset.
Attitude
The mental stance of an individual or group regarding a fact, an issue, a role, a task or a function. When scoped to a specific topic or domain, a form or aspect of competency. Often used in reference to the psychological stance that may be required by a task or function, as different from skill and knowledge. See also competency, knowledge, skill.
Blended learning
An approach to learning that blends different technologies or that blends technology and other approaches in the learning process. May include just about anything: Books, classroom instruction, hands-on experience, online self-paced instruction, online chat, online conferencing, podcasting, etc.
Certified
An implementation is said to be certified to be
conformant with a recommendation,
specification or standard if a credible
third party can
provide proof that conformance has been verified. This
usually takes the form of a certificate of conformance.
Self-certification by a vendor is usually not considered
credible.
CMI
Literally, "Computer Managed Instruction", although the
acronym is often used nowadays without this particular
meaning. An acronym inherited from older AICC specifications.
This acronym is used by
SCORM to name one of the data
models used in with the SCORM API
for historical reasons. Older versions of SCORM were using
a data model based on the AICC specification. The current
version of SCORM uses a slightly different data model that
conforms to an IEEE standard. The main base document from
which the IEEE standard was elaborated was the CMI
specification from AICC.
Competence
A term loaded with many quasi-religious beliefs by various communities of practice, used mostly to describe the context-specific abilities of an individual to perform a task or a role in an organization. Sometimes described as the aggregate of the competencies, aptitude, general attitude and other personal characteristics of a person as they are developed or exist in a particular context. The purpose of learning technology is usually to help build competence among individuals and groups, through the development of targeted competencies specified as learning objectives. Competence is usually assumed to be a prerequisite for performance. Note: Countless hours, days and years have been wasted by countless smart people in trying to specify universal standard definitions for the terms "competence" and "competency." This is in league with the time wasted in futile attempts to create universally accepted standard definitions for the terms "knowledge", "art" and "a good time."
Competency
A term loaded with many quasi-religious beliefs by various communities of practice, used mostly as a catch-all term for any skill, knowledgeor attitude that contributes to competence or to a higher order competency, or any combination of those. See also objective, learning objective.
Competency Context
The operational or semantic context in which a community of practice's beliefs about a specific competency or a domain of competence are interpreted in practice. For example, a competency model for driving a car may be interpreted differently depending on whether the context is night or day. Competency contexts are sometimes defined as tasks, administrative classifications, qualifications, roles or functions in an enterprise.
Competency evidence
Evidence that a person meets or does not meet the specified expectations for a particular competency. Can take many forms: a certificate such as a driver's license, the results of an exam, manager's appraisal, interview notes collected during a hiring process, assessment of the quality of a work product in a portfolio, etc. The trustworthiness of competency evidence can vary greatly depending on the source of evidence and the assessment method used.
Competency Map
A form of competency model in which nodes in a graph are mapped to reusable competency definitions and possibly other competency maps. A competency map may also show relationships and dependencies between competencies.
Competency Model
A more or less formal description of a community of practice's beliefs about a specific competency or a domain of competence. Competency models range in formality and complexity from simple lists of competency titles to intricate ontologies that may map thousands or millions of assumptions and semantic relationships.
Compliant
An implementation is said to be compliant with a
recommendation, specification
or standard if it designed or specified to
meet all the requirements spelled out in a recommendation,
specification or standard, but conformance cannot be
verified. The term "compliant" is often used as a euphemism
in sales and marketing materials to hide the fact that an
implementation is not truly conformant or
cannot be certified.
Conformant
Also: conforming. An implementation is said to be
conformant with a recommendation,
specification or standard if it can be verified that it
meets all the requirements spelled out in a recommendation,
specification or standard. See also certified and compliant.
Cross-domain
A web-specific term that refers to a situation where content comes from different web servers, or where content from one server interacts invisibly with another server that belongs to someone else. Cross-domain issues are very important for web delivery of learning content and learning experience, because security measures must be in place to prevent cross-domain exploits by hackers. Cross-domain exploits have been used to deface or hijack web sites, to inject malware onto client computers, or to get unauthorized access to data. In learning technology, there can be difficulties if a LMS on one server but is used to deliver content from another server, such as when content is provided by a third party vendor from their own server.
Data model
The specification of a set of data elements and the
associated value spaces. Data models range from very simple
to very complex. Data models can be formally specified
using a syntax defined by the ISO11404 standard, or by other
language and syntax conventions, such as an XMLschema.
ECMAScript
The Standard ECMA-262
ECMAScript Language Specification, identical to the ISO/IEC 16262 Standard. This is an international
standard based on Netscape's original JavaScript. This is the common standard scripting language implemented
by modern web browsers. The implementation of ECMAScript is called JScript in Microsoft browsers and
JavaScript in most other browsers. In common use, most people and documents use the term "JavaScript"
when they really mean "ECMAScript". The full text of the standard can be freely downloaded from ECMA-262
IEEE
Learning Technology Standards Committee of the
Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers. An
international organization that sponsors the development of
electrical, electronic and software standards and publishes
those standards. Members of the IEEE are individuals,
rather than companies, agencies or nations like many other
standards organizations. The IEEE follows a rigorous
ISO accredited, open process. Web site:
http://wwww.ieee.org.
IEEE LTSC
The Learning Technology Standards Committee of the
IEEE. One of the most transparent standards organizations
for learning technology, which developed several of the IEEE standards used in SCORM.
Members are individuals and anyone with a material interest
can participate without paying exorbitant fees. For more information, including information about how
to how to participate in this committee, see the LTSC web
site at http://www.ieeeltsc.org
IMS Global Learning
Consortium
A consortium dominated by academic institutions and
vendors that develops and publishes specifications for learning
technology. Some of those specifications are used or
referenced in the SCORM
specifications. Web site: http://wwww.imsglobal.org. Note: The acronym IMS in IMS Global Learning Consortium no longer has a specific meaning. Not to be confused with the IT industry acronym IMS meaning "IP Multimedia Subsystems."
ISO
International Organization for Standardization
Organization. Operating conjointly with IEC (International
Electrotechnical Commission.) The umbrella international
organization that sponsors the development of official
international standards and publishes those standards.
Members of the ISO are nations, rather than individuals,
companies or agencies. The ISO follows a rigorous, often
highly politicized process for standards development and
publications. Web site: http://wwww.iso.org.
ISO 11404
An ISO specification that defines a
syntax for writing data
models.
Knowledge
What is known by an individual or group. When scoped to a specific topic or domain, a form or aspect of competency. Often used in reference to cognitive abilities that may be required by a task or function, as different from skill and attitude. See also attitude, competency, skill.
Launchable asset
In SCORM, an asset
described by launchable resource data element in a
manifest. Unlike a SCO,
a launchable asset is not expected to
communicate with the through the SCORMAPI. A launchable asset described by a
resource may be an atomic asset (a single file) or it may
also have dependencies. For example, a Flash movie
published in a HTML "container" page and that itself loads
other Flash files as it goes, but with no expectation of
communication with the SCORM API, can be described as a
launchable asset in a resource
element.
Launchable resource
In SCORM, a
resource element in a manifest that specifies a digital resource
to be launched to perform an activity specified in the
manifest. In the manifest, such a resource element has an
attribute named "href". A SCORM conformant RTE uses the
value of this attribute to construct a complete URL and
then uses the URL to launch the resource in a web browser window or
frame.
Learning Management System
(LMS)
A learning management system typically includes
facilities to register learners, assign learning
activities, allow access to learning content, deliver the
learning content, and track and report results of the use
of the learning content and other learning activities.
Learning object
Any resource, digital or not, that can be used in a learning process or assessment of learning, and which is described by learning object metadata. Some communities of practice reduce the scope of what they define as a learning object to digital resources, or to digital resources with some specific characteristics. See also See Learning Object Metadata.
Learning Object Metadata
(LOM)
A set of IEEE standards for
metadata describing learning objects. One defines a
data model for the metadata and
specifies the structure and meaning of the data elements.
All elements are optional but it they are used they must
conform to the standard. The other standard defines the
conformance requirements for XML
schemas for instances of the data model.
Learning Objective
The more or less formal specification of a competency to be achieved through a learning process and verifiable through some form of assessment. Sometimes the meaning of the term Learning Objective is extended to include learning tasks to be performed although no formal assessment of an acquired competency is performed in association with those tasks.
In the SCORMspecifications, an XML
document that contains an inventory and
description of the content of a SCORM package. This
document must be included in the package. The document may
include metadata describing the package or its components.
If the package is intended for delivery to a learner, it
must contain prescriptive information for the delivery of
the package, such as an activity tree. The activity tree
may have associated with sequencing rules.
Metadata
Literally, "data about data". In SCORM, metadata can be used to describe
packages and components of packages. The recommended
metadata format is defined in the IEEELOM standards.
Non launchable resource
In SCORM, a resource element in a manifest that specifies a Resource that
exists only to be referenced by one or more other resource
elements. Such a resource element simply contains a list of
one or more files or maybe even other resources on which
one or more other resource depends. This is convenient to
inventory shared files so they don't have to be repeated in
the other resource elements.
Objective
In SCORM, a data model that is used to keep track of
the status of a learning objective or competency. The SCORM
specification uses the term objective for four different
purposes: (a) For an objective record in the CMI data model used for communication between
SCOs and the SCORM API, (b) for objectives implicitly or explicitly
specified for an activity, (c) for global objectives whose
success is being tracked while delivering a SCORM content
package, and (d) for global objectives whose success is
being tracked in a LMS independently of any specific
content package. The SCORM RTE and
Sequencing specifications define how to use those objective
data elements and how they can influence each other when a
SCORM package is delivered, sequenced and tracked.
PENS
PENS is a recommendation developed by the AICC to specify how to automate the process of publishing learning content from an authoring environment into in a learning management system.
Profile
In standards, a profile is a derived specification or standards. The profile specifies
how to interpret and use one or more standards, specifications or recommendations for
a particular purpose. For example, SCORM is a profile of standards and specifications
from the IEEE, IMS and W3C.
Recommendation
A document or set of documents published by a standards
organization. Usually, a recommendation does not have the
legal status of a standard, but
some recommendations become de facto standards if they are
widely adopted. See also specification.
Resource
An imprecise term for anything, digital or not, online
or not, that can be used in any task. In SCORM, some specific meanings are ascribed to
this term. See resource
element.
In SCORM, the runtime environment
that is used by a LMS to deliver SCORM
packages to a learner. The RTE may be an integral part of
the LMS or it may be a separate service used by the LMS
when it needs to deliver and track SCORM content. In some
SCORM documents, the terms "LMS" and "RTE" are used
interchangeably and sometimes in a confusing manner. It may
help to consider that the RTE is basically the
manifestation of the LMS while SCORM content is being
delivered.
SCO
Acronym for Shareable Content Object. In SCORM, a content object
asset described by launchable resource data element in a
manifest. Unlike a launchable asset, a SCO is required
to communicate with the RTE through the
SCORM API. A SCO may depend on
various "non-launchable" assets, which are various files
that are required for the delivery of the resource. For
example, a HTML SCO will often depend on additional
graphics, one or more style sheets, one or more script
files, and other HTML pages. It may be the container used
to display a Flash file and provide a relay between Flash
and the SCORM API, etc. See also Learning Object.
SCORM
Acronym for Sharable Content Object Reference Model. Defined in a
set of specifications published and maintained by the
ADL. The current version is SCORM 2004.
Previous versions are considered obsolete and are no longer
officially supported by the ADL.
SCORM TWG
The advisory technical working group convened by the
ADL to review and resolve issues arising
in the SCORM specifications. Members are developers of
learning management systems, runtime environments and SCORM
content as well as other experts in the field.
Skill
The ability to perform a task or a function. A form or aspect of competency. Often used in reference to procedural competence or observable behavior, as different from knowledge or attitude. See also attitude, competency, knowledge.
Specification
A document or set of documents published by a standards
organization. Usually, a specification does not have the
legal status of a standard, but
some specifications become de facto standards if they are
widely adopted. See also recommendation.
Standard
A document or set of documents published by a standards
organization and developed using an ISO
accredited process. Usually, a standard is legally
recognized by government authorities, unlike a recommendation
or specification. That is the legal definition of a standard. The term is also commonly used to describe anything a community of practice considers to be a requirement. This can lead to a lot of confusion, e.g. "Educational standards" can mean very different things to different communities of practice.
Task
A work item that has to be completed according to specific criteria, usually with a deadline. Often used with different meanings in military or training contexts. Sometimes "task" is meant to designate a work context or an area of competence rather than in reference to a specific task instance. It may be useful to think of a competency definition as the explicit definition of a competency that contributes to the ability to perform a task. See also competency.
W3C
The World Wide Web (W3) Consortium. A standards
organization that develops and publishes recommendations
for documents and services on the Internet. Web site:
http://www.w3c.org.
XML
Extensible Markup Language. A computer language to
specify data in an almost human readable way, by using tags
with attributes to surround and name data values in a text
document. Defined and maintained by the W3C consortium.
XML Schema
Extensible Markup Language Schema. A document that
specifies the data model and
syntax for other XML documents. The specification for how
to write and use XML schemas is defined and maintained by
the W3C consortium.
XML Validation
A process to verify that an document
conforms to the syntax, data model
and structure specified in an XML
schema. Validation does not guarantee that the data in
the XML document makes sense, but it guarantees that the
data is well formed and that the document syntax is
correct.
XSD
XML Schema Document. XSD is, by convention, used as the
extension for the file name for XML
schema documents. Because SCORM
uses XSD files extensively to specify and validate the
XML documents in a SCORM package, a
SCORM package must include specific XSD files.
