A major issue with any kind of elearning is motivation.
Originally a major part of the idea behind elearning and learning software was to harness the motivational element so obvious in computer games with a learning environment in order to increase learning effectiveness.
Yet precisely this motivational element has been the most controversial and elusive element in serious elearning environments and learning software, especially those where content is not pre-programmed but can be authored by educators who enter their own content into a flexible quiz authoring tool.
At Image Intelligence Software, we have developed a range of strategies for meeting this challenge, one of which is online learning communities. Learning has numerous social components, including competition, cooperation and comparison. Social components such as these support learning. If a computer-based learning environment omits these components, it is at an immediate disadvantage. On the other hand, the computing gaming world has dramatically shown how multiplayer elements, especially online multiplayer facilities, raise motivation and interest.
The Qedoc Quiz Player supports two basic types of online multiplayer environment, which we call public and private learning communities.
Public learning communities are automatically created for any module that anyone ever creates. Anyone using the Qedoc Quiz Player can upload their results to our site where they will be combined with those of everyone else playing the same module. Our website returns the current scores of all players to the Qedoc Quiz Player as a Hall of Fame or ladder. For security reasons, each player can only ever see their own name - all other names are anonymized (replaced with realistic pseudonyms). Transfers are anonymous and all data is held anonymously.
Private learning communities can be created by anyone using the Qedoc Quiz Player. All they have to do is request a private learning community and create a password. The community is then password-protected and invisible to anyone without the password. The major advantage for social learning is that real names are used. For example, classmates, friends or work colleagues can set up their own ladder of Hall of Fame using their real names rather than pseudonyms.
For more information, please refer to the white paper on online learning communities.
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