A Reusable Learning-Object Approach to Designing Online Courses

While the concept of utilizing learning objects has been addressed in instructional design for some time, slightly different definitions of the term “learning object” are found in the literature. For example, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) (2005) defines a learning object as “any entity, digital or non-digital, which can be used, re-used or referenced during technology supported learning.” Wiley (2000) similarly defines a learning object as “any digital resource that can be reused to support learning” (p. 7). Barritt and Alderman (2004) state a working definition of learning objects as “an independent collection of content and media elements, a learning approach (interactivity, learning architecture, context), and metadata (used for storage and searching)” (pp. 7-8). Merrill (1996) uses a different term, a “knowledge object” that consists of a set of predefined elements, each of which is “instantiated by way of a multimedia resource (text, audio, video, graphic) or a pointer to another knowledge object” (p. 32).