Connexions | Creative Commons
“…Instructors will be able to do away with huge chunks of text that don’t apply to their courses, while culling the Connexions database for pieces that apply to their specific areas of instructors. To make that task manageable, Connexions will offer a series of "lenses" that allow users to limit the pool from which they’re choosing. In other words, if Baraniuk wanted to limit his search to courses that the dean liked, he could do so. Or he might choose to view modules that other users had ranked as effective…”
Well, diving right in from my previous post, I saw this on the creative commons ‘featured commoners’ page.
Basically, this sounds like one massive re-usable learning objects repository – but one that actually a) works b) doesn’t cost seven figures and c) (most importantly) provides a real educational value.
It also could potentially deliver on the utopian dream of e-learning actually benefitting poorer schools and organisations by providing low-cost access to world class materials.
The other interesting angle is the use of a creative commons licence for usage, which as the rather gustily written article tells us, frees up content providers to supply content without losing intellectual property rights.
And the final interesting angle is that it allows content to be built in very quick, defined, relevant ways – if (and it’s a big if), the building tools work well enough. And of course the content is in xml, so you could have a cohesive presentation of content that fits with your particular needs.