H. Mispelkamp et L. Sarti, DISCOURSE - TOOLS FOR THE DESIGN OF LEARNING-MATERIAL, Materials science & engineering. A, Structural materials: properties, microstructure and processing, 199(1), 1995, pp. 99-107
This contribution covers those areas of courseware design that can be
supported with computerised tools, like learner modelling, instruction
al design and domain representation. In the Design and Interactive Spe
cification of Courseware (DISCourse) framework the learner is modelled
from both a static perspective and a dynamic one. The static model ac
counts for those learner characteristics which are largely independent
from the specific domain being taught while the dynamic model monitor
s the student's progress with respect to the author's declared goals.
The selection and application of suitable instructional strategies are
based on a generic tutoring environment (GTE), an environment where t
eaching expertise is represented independently of the particular domai
n being taught. GTE's libraries provide tasks, methods and objects to
navigate course structures, elaborate on individual contents, manage e
xercises and evaluate the student's progresses. In the paper more deta
il is devoted to the area of domain and content representation. In the
domain analysis, an author produces a description of the entities of
interest in the subject domain; this representation is independent of
any specific instructional strategy, and is therefore completely reusa
ble. The learning goal analysis is devoted to the description of the d
egree of mastery the learner should acquire for each given element of
content. The goals are expressed in terms of knowledge, understanding
and ability of application of the given element of content. In the con
tent analysis, an author elaborates on the domain representation, cust
omising it to the particular instructional purpose of the courseware u
nder development. Topics of interest are selected, pre-requisite links
are added and the elements of content are further typified to add str
ucturing information which will be used in the strategy selection. The
content analysis is tightly interrelated with the learning goal analy
sis, and these two are often performed concurrently.