Bas Giesbers

A Design Model for Lifelong Learning Networks

The provision of lifelong learning facilities is considered to be a major new direction for higher and distance teaching educational institutes catering for the demands of industry and society. ICT networks will in future support seamless, ubiquitous access to lifelong learning facilities at home, at work, in schools and universities. This implies the development of new ways of organizing learning delivery that goes beyond course and programme-centric models. It envisions a learner-centred, learner-controlled model of distributed lifelong learning. We present a conceptual model for the support of lifelong learning which is based on notions from self-organization theory, learning communities, agent technologies and learning technology specifications such as IMS Learning Design. An exploratory implementation has been developed and used in practice. We reflect on the findings and future directions.

Modeling assessment for re-use of traditional and new types of assessment

In the new learning approach assessment is integrated in learning and instruction and addresses complex traits (the abilities, the characteristics in a specific domain) of students. To match this new approach, new types of assessment are developed, like peer assessment or competence assessment. The development of these new assessments is an expensive and intensive activity. Exchange initiatives promise to reduce those efforts by the re-use of materials. But they also raise questions: is it a complete assessment or are there specific parts of an assessment that can be re-used? And is re-use limited to particular item formats? In order to support the re-use of both new and traditional assessment types an educational model for assessment is developed. In this article we present this model. The model is validated against [Stiggins, R. J. (1992). Het ontwerpen en ontwikkelen van performance-assessment toetsen [Design and development of performance assessments]. In J. W. M. Kessels, & C. A. Smit (Eds.). Opleiders in organisaties/Capita Selecta (pp. 75-91). Deventer: Kluwer (afl. 10)] guidelines for the development of performance assessments, the four-process framework of [Almond, R. G., Steinberg, L., & Mislevy, R. J. (2001). A sample assessment using the four-process framework. CSE Report 543. Center for study of evaluation, University of California, Los Angeles. Retrieved November 15, 2005 from http://www.cse.ucla.edu/cresst/reports/tech543.pdf; Almond, R. G., Steinberg, L., & Mislevy, R. J. (2003). A four-process architecture for assessment delivery, with connections to assessment design. CSE Report 616. Center for study of evaluation. University of California, Los Angeles], a specification for the exchange and interoperability of assessments and performance assessment as a new type of assessment. The educational model for assessment gives new input to the alignment of the teaching, learning and assessment.

Positioning of Learners in Learning Networks with Content, Metadata and Ontologies

Positioning in learning networks is a process that assists learners in finding a starting point and an efficient route through the network that will foster competence building. In the past we have explored computational approaches to positioning based on the contents of the learning network and the behaviour of those participating in it, more or less ignoring different efforts to stimulate positioning and competence development from a top-down perspective. In this paper we introduce a research agenda for positioning in learning networks, discuss several cases and give an outlook on the development of a positioning service for learning networks.

Content-Based Positioning in Learning Networks

Positioning in learning networks is a process that assists learners in finding a starting point and an efficient route in the network that will foster their competence building. In order to avoid labor-intense routines in the network we explore computational approaches to services such as positioning that are based on the contents of the learning network and the behavior of those participating in it, rather than in predefined procedures and (meta-) data. We present a content-based approach to positioning that uses latent semantic analysis to compare learner portfolios to contents offered in the learning network. Initial results indicate the feasibility of the approach, but a number of important caveats are discussed.

A model for new linkages for prior learning assessment

Kalz, M., Van Bruggen, J., Giesbers, B., Eshuis, J., Waterink, W., & Koper, R. (2008). A Model for New Linkages for Prior Learning Assessment. Campus Wide Information Systems, 25(4), 233-243. [See also http://hdl.handle.net/1820/1679 ]