Solution Building Blocks for a Personalised Learning Experience

Our view is that several building blocks of a technology supported personalised and adaptive learning experience are developing and evolving in parallel over time.

If the powerful intelligent technology supported learning processes envisaged by many academics and solution developers are to be realised significant advances in the production of large volumes of flexible and high quality digital curriculum and formative assessment resources and processes will be required. In addition the teaching practice, experience and broad acceptance are essential in order to prepare and use powerful learning platforms that are emerging.

The diagram represents our view on key building blocks for this solution and the progression of capabilities over time.

A strong commitment by developers to an open standards-based integration of these building blocks will also be required using robust API and SDK to support the integration.

Without this strong supporting environment the potential of data analytics and feedback loops, and the technology supported adaptive learning environments proposed providing the learner with multiple personalised learning pathways envisaged cannot be realised.

We see this as a long-term evolutionary build out by many solution developers. Like building a skyscraper, the foundation and middle steps need to be built out now in order to support the advanced data analytics and adaptive solutions. Technologies are maturing and the standards and frameworks for learning interoperability LTI (Learning Tools Interoperability) and Caliper from the IMS Global standards body and the Experience API (xAPI) from the Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL) Initiative are all becoming more widely adopted.