I’ve never been a big fan of SCORM as a standard. Whilst I can easily buy into the need for such a standard to exist, it’s always bothered me that we’ve been forced into reverting to type whenever SCORM comes into the debate. The philosophy forces one into creating packages of sequenced content for learners to play through. It’s like my worst nightmare of a classroom session; a fixed lecture where you get tested for rote retention.
Enter Tin Can. For those of you outside the loop, Tin Can is the name given to the latest iteration of the SCORM family. It’s not a progression of the SCORM standard, it’s a complete change in the underpinning philosophy. And it’s pretty exciting, which isn’t an emotion I often associate with SCORM.
There is a familiar side to Tin Can – that which allows content to talk back to a Learning Record Store (LRS). That’s not overly revolutionary and isn’t enough to redefine the standard on its own. What is much more like it is the “Statement Generation” end of the standard.
Let me give you an insight into the power of Statement Generation. At it’s most basic, Tin Can produces statements about what a learner did: “Joe completed the Activity”. So far, so familiar. But extend this outside of Courseware, into everyday working life; “Joe checked-in at the call centre”. And now, use it in a more social context: “Joe was insightful about Performance Management”. I can do the latter because Joe can contribute to a knowledge environment and his contribution can be rated by his peers. And using Tin Can, I can know this.
Using this sort of technique Tin Can aligns itself well with the notion of Big Data in the workplace. Talent Management systems are lining up to try and change the way we do business by offering a depth and detail of analysis about workplace performance that we’ve not seen before. But, for me, there is still a challenge in how this data gets collected in the first place. Surveys, 360’s and other feedback tools have a place, but they aren’t frequent or detailed enough to really capture the picture of who ‘I am’. Tin Can experiences could offer this level of detail. And because the statements can be generated behind the scenes and reported back to a central place, there’s no overhead in doing it. We’re all going to get tracked a lot more in the future, but it won’t be about completing courses, it will be about how we go about doing our jobs on a day-to-day basis.
In short, I think Tin Can offers a glimpse of the future; a part of a long chain of systems and technologies that underpin the 2020 workplace. With players like Oracle acquiring talent management companies like Taleo, we’re seeing a clear appetite for data companies to take this challenge on. I’m backing Tin Can to help us take our next smallest steps towards this future.
#1 by Ali Shahrazad at July 23rd, 2012
Hello, thanks for the post. Love your take on how this can impact workplace performance. Tin Can will be a game changing factor in tying intelligence gained from different mobile, social and informal learning activities to actual performance data!
Saltbox is building an LRS that adds value through providing learning analytics (with our future vision of tying it to business results in the workplace). If you are interested in learning more about our stand-alone LRS go to http://www.waxlrs.com for more information and updates!
Thank you,
Ali
#2 by Kelly Meeker at July 24th, 2012
Great insights on applications of Tin Can – always useful to understand how learning designers will find new technology applicable to the experiences they’re interested in creating.
#3 by Doug Wallace at July 30th, 2012
Tin Can is interesting as a way to set communication standards so LMS can all let outside stuff talk back in a way beyond the SCORM API. Full stop. We are using it to extend our Activities on our Learning Paths. BUT I worry this is yet another side show. Like those who follow fad diets one after the other rather than facing they need to have will power to lose the pounds the eLearning community wants new standards to constantly to avoid doing the work of creating structured content.
Extend the LMS to federate learning across all kinds of learning experiences but know that this will create more work to codify and classify these new learning types.
As for “insightful” as a way to record a learning activity I can’t imagine a consensus. I find people have a hard enough time with Pass / Fail Complete / incomplete.
#4 by Ben at July 30th, 2012
Consensus comes from the crowd. Collect enough data and reliable trends emerge is what I’m saying.
#5 by Doug Wallace at July 30th, 2012
I get what your saying and it is very interesting. But I just don’t see my customers doing it. Tin Can let me give them options to include non standard stuff. BTW we have been doing this for years by making a scorm wrapper around it call back to the LMS but I agree this part of Tin Can will make this more open.
I really don’t think Verbs is the future, and I am sad because it sounds so good I know it will sell and folks will have these new systems sit idol.
#6 by James Ryan at August 2nd, 2012
Don’t you mean Competent/Competency Not Demonstrated
#7 by Ali Shahrazad at August 5th, 2012
Verbs are a very small part of the Tin Can ecosystem. You can build a better understanding of learning activities by looking at the statement structure with context. Measuring pass/fail/complete/incomplete is useless, and a natural learning environment should not be comprised of mostly structured content and formal learning…at least we know the current generation doesn’t think so and we need to remember who we are serving/supporting.
Also, we really don’t know what these “new systems” will do. I think the community needs to define that before we assume they will fail or just sit idol.
#8 by Paul Schneider at August 8th, 2012
I really have to disagree with your assessment of SCORM. In reality most folks don’t bother with the sequencing (very few LMSes/Authoring tools really got it right) so the content itself can really be set up any old way. It is more the turn my Powerpoint into a course with little or no thought that results in the scenario you describe.
That ASIDE – Tin Can really does open the doors for some neat possibilities. You nailed it on the big data. Though this situation is definitely a chicken and egg thing. What I like most though is seeing the possibilities of still sending the SCORM data, but at the same time, starting to send tin can data to another location or repository. Provides a nice bridge for something that will take some more momentum to realize its potential. (Even look at simple web analytics and some of the things companies like facebook and google are doing, it wasn’t that long ago when there was nothing like the data they are compiling and mining) – maybe we need to tie ads to learning to get the boost!
#9 by Joshua at September 6th, 2012
Hi B.J,Thanks for the mention of the CellCast Solution in your posnitg. Indeed, our experience has shown that moving from a working prototype/active pilot stage into a production environment with a mobile learning project can add tremendous complexity in all the areas you cited technology, politics, logistics and security (and others to boot!). The bigger the organization/objectives, the more people in the enterprise space who are there to say no or not now/not yet . This is certainly one of the reasons we worked with our early customers and partners to develop the core CellCast Solution platform since it targets deliverables at that lowest common denominator level of voice/IVR and SMS (1-way or 2-way) virtually every cellphone is capable of leveraging these delivery modalities without any restrictions of device type or carrier plan and no one needs use training on how to make a call or send/receive messages. The differentiating aspects of our approach comes down to management and tracking who, when, for how long, did they learn/remember anything, what else can they add/offer to the conversation? and have that all manifest into an easy to install/integrate platform that reports results back to an existing LMS, ERP, CRM or SFA application.Another valuable lesson we’ve learned to date is this: mlearning is a not elearning smashed down onto a smaller screen/device; rather, what works best in the mobile space is some combination of up-to-date access to new content and information packaged in small, easy to consume nuggets that help with knowledge retention, learning reinforcement, act as quick reference tools or job aides, provide J-I-T performance support. Something as simple as a scheduled series of SMS messages in the form of reminders or updates automatically sent out to every mobile phone 30 days after they attended a big ILT event or corporate webinar can have dramatic impact on knowledge retention and Kirkpatrick Level 3 reinforcement. Better yet, allowing managers and learners to use their mobile phones to call in and record fresh, up-to-the-minute knowledge nuggets about a new customer win or meaningful field service support strategy and immediately route that information back to coworkers/subordinates via their own cellphones makes the whole mobile experience transformative this is what’s essential in our mind. mLearning is not eLearning on a smaller, cheaper device or network; it must be and become something else given the way knowledge workers and millennials work, think and play.My two cents worth (okay, 10 cents)!Cheers and keep up the great work on your blog.