e-Training Terms and Definitions
On this page, you will find common terms and definitions associated with e-training. Click on the term to read the definition.
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508 Compliant – In 1998, Congress amended the Rehabilitation Act to require Federal agencies to make their electronic and information technology accessible to people with disabilities. Section 508 was enacted to eliminate barriers in information technology, to make available new opportunities for people with disabilities, and to encourage development of technologies that will help achieve these goals. The law applies to all Federal agencies when they develop, procure, maintain, or use electronic and information technology. Under Section 508 (29 U.S.C. ‘ 794d), agencies must give disabled employees and members of the public access to information that is comparable to the access available to others. 1
As a general rule, TheAcademy.com’s courses are not 508 compliant unless specifically requested. For more information, go to http://www.section508.gov/
1 Information from http://www.section508.gov/
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Blended Learning – Blended learning refers to a solution that combines several different training delivery methods, such as classroom training, online courses and webinars. Many of our clients come to us with some type of live/classroom training and wish to expand into offering training online but do not wish to completely eliminate live training. Many of the early learning management systems (LMSs) only tracked online training, but no live training, which led to having to use multiple training solutions. TheAcademy.com developed TheAcademy.com Athena Vanguard Learning Management System which can be used to track both online and live learning events, so you can consolidate all your training management into one system.
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E-Learning or E-Training – Electronic learning, E-Learning/E-Training is a general term used to refer to computer-enhanced learning. E-Learning is naturally suited to distance learning and flexible learning, but can also be used in conjunction with face-to-face teaching, in which case the term Blended Learning is commonly used.1
1 Information from Wikipedia
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E-Learning 2.0 – As the technology of the internet evolves, more opportunities arise. For example, in the past several years the use of blogs has exploded on the web. Wikipedia has, in the eyes of many, become a better source of information than a traditional encyclopedia. Millions of people spend hours a day interacting with one another through instant messaging, cell phones, and social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook. What these things have in common is that the value of blogs, wikis, and social networks comes from individual users. E-Learning 2.0 is a term that encompasses these same ideas – that learning online can be enriched by individual contributions either along side or in lieu of traditional courses. By giving individuals the ability to contribute content, organize content, easily find content that they’re interested in, and share it all with others the system will, over time, become richer than would ever be possible with a classic learning environment.
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IACET – The International Association for Continuing Education and Training (IACET), based in Washington, D. C. The IACET CEU was created as a measurement of quality continuing education. One IACET CEU is equal to ten hours of participation in an organized continuing education experience under responsible sponsorship, capable direction, and qualified instruction. TheAcademy.com is one of a limited number of on-line training providers to receive approval as an Authorized Provider.
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Learning Management System (LMS) – LMS stands for Learning Management System and enables the management and delivery of online content to learners. The key term here is management. It is very possible to create a website and host your e-training on the site, but without an LMS behind it, managing and maintaining your program will become very tedious and time inefficient. There are a variety of different aspects an LMS can manage and they differ from LMS to LMS. An LMS can manage anything from user registration, the delivery of courseware and assessments, to tracking of student progress. Learning Management Systems also allow administrators to run multiple reports to analyze student use of the system and progress.
A popular trend for Learning Management Systems is the inclusion of tools for competency management, skills-gap analysis, and succession planning. At the core, an LMS manages online training but because so many organizations also use live training, Learning Management Systems often offer components to help with the management and tracking of live training events as well as the online ones. Learning Management System vendors are constantly working to develop a product that will maintain all aspects of your training program so everything is located at a single source to help improve efficiency.
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Mobile Learning – As cell phones and portable music players become more widespread, the opportunity to use those devices for learning arises. For example, an organization, association or training provider can take advantage of mobile learning by offering mobile phone accessible versions of their courses or by offering audio podcasts that can be downloaded onto portable music players and listened to whenever and wherever.
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Scenario-Based Learning – Scenario-Based Learning aims to teach by putting the learner into situations, recording their decisions, and either ending or continuing the simulation based on their response. The idea behind Scenario-Based Learning is that people learn better through experiencing something than through reading about it.
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SCORM – SCORM is a collection of standards and specifications adapted from multiple sources to provide a comprehensive suite of e-learning capabilities that enable interoperability, accessibility and reusability of Web-based learning content.
In order to use SCORM compliant courses with your Learning Management System, your LMS must be SCORM compliant. In order for your LMS to run courses created or purchased from third party vendors, the course needs to be SCORM compliant.
One thing about SCORM that is often overlooked is that there are different versions of SCORM. Your LMS must support the SCORM version that your course is developed in. Currently, the most common version of SCORM is 1.2, but the latest and supposedly final version of SCORM is 2004 3rd edition. More and more LMS vendors and courses are moving towards SCORM 2004 3rd edition.
The SCORM standards for vendor interoperability are still not universally defined and adopted so it is not inconceivable that problems will arise when first installing a SCORM course for use on your SCORM compliant LMS.
TheAcademy.com Athena Learning Management System currently supports SCORM 1.2 and SCORM 2004 2nd and 3rd editions. If you have existing courses, as long as they are SCORM 1.2, SCORM 2004 2nd, or SCORM 2004 3rd edition, we should be able to support the course without problems.
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Sharable Content Object (SCO) – A Sharable Content Object is a single launchable resource, typically a webpage, that can communicate with the LMS that launched it through the SCORM run-time environment. A SCO is considered sharable since it can be reused in multiple SCORM based courses.
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