Versioning a Curriculum

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In e-learning, a curriculum may manifest in various forms. Focusing on this flexibility saves time, effort, and resources on curricular and multimedia development.

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Versioning for Learners

A curriculum may be versioned for different types of learners. An official academic curriculum may be changed for use in a commercial training for practitioners in the field, for example. The curriculum may be modified for different cultural contexts, such as those of different ethnic, national and cultural backgrounds. A curriculum may be ramped up for experts in a field for value-added learning, or it may be simplified for those in the 9th -12th grade (high school) levels.

Versioning for Different Learning Strategies

A curriculum may be versioned for different learning strategies. For example, contents for a simulation may be turned into live (local) field trips for actual experiential learning. Or an individual term project may be changed into a group or team project. Project-based learning may be reformulated into problem-based learning.

A course build may result in digital contents and strategies for stand-alone trainings, modularized learning, short courses, and other types of learning.

Versioning for Delivery Methods

Online learning takes many forms. It may be synchronous (real-time) or asynchronous (non-real-time). It may be a clearly sequenced course, or it may be set up as an open-entry, open-exit, learner-determined / selected sort of learning (think a la carte).

E-learning may be part of a hybrid or blended learning strategy.

These different learning "delivery methods" will affect how a curriculum may be versioned.

Versioning for Languages

Professional communicators suggest "simple English" as a method for making a curriculum the most effective for machine translations into other languages. While a curriculum may be expressed as simple English, others may involve actual human translations of the contents into specific foreign languages for the highest accuracy. A curriculum may be versioned with cultural "sensitivity" (tailored to a particular culture) or cultural "neutrality" (created in a way to be "universal") for the most effective learning.

Versioning for Technologies

The delivery of the electronic learning may be through learning / course management systems (L/CMSes), mobile devices, or augmented reality installations. An e-learning curriculum may be versioned to the proper file formats for these various types of learning.

On balance, the idea is to not dilute a curriculum in versioning it but to make sure it has more flexibility and learning value.

See Also

References