An object-oriented system is designed to enhance the instruction in a telecommunication and networking course. The areas covered include rationale for using a hypermedia structure, multi-modal instruction and development strategies, instructional design components, systems architecture, and course content and unit organization

Bland, Karen

Emdad, Ali

English

AIS Electronic Library (AISeL)

Association for Information SystemsAIS Electronic Library (AISeL)AMCIS 1998 Proceedings Americas Conference on Information Systems(AMCIS)December 1998An Object-oriented Design for an Adaptive Systemto Augment a Telecommunication andNetworking Systems (TNS) CourseKaren BlandMorgan State UniversityAli EmdadMorgan State UniversityFollow this and additional works at: http://aisel.aisnet.org/amcis1998This material is brought to you by the Americas Conference on Information Systems (AMCIS) at AIS Electronic Library (AISeL). It has been acceptedfor inclusion in AMCIS 1998 Proceedings by an authorized administrator of AIS Electronic Library (AISeL). For more information, please contactelibrary@aisnet.org.Recommended CitationBland, Karen and Emdad, Ali, "An Object-oriented Design for an Adaptive System to Augment a Telecommunication and NetworkingSystems (TNS) Course" (1998). AMCIS 1998 Proceedings. 351.http://aisel.aisnet.org/amcis1998/351-1031-An Object-oriented Design for an Adaptive System to Augment aTelecommunication and Networking Systems (TNS) CourseKaren E. BlandAli F. EmdadMorgan State UniversityAbstractAn object-oriented system is designed to enhance the instruction in a telecommunication and networkingcourse.   The areas covered include rationale for using a hypermedia structure, multi-modal instruction anddevelopment strategies, instructional design components, systems architecture, and course content and unitorganization.Telecommunication is a highly abstract subject area.  Unlike much of IS technology, telecommunication signals, nor thedevices that support such signals, can be ’seen or touched’.  The physical devices, whether they be hubs, routers or bridges, cannotbe visually discriminated.  Thus, most of the technology associated with telecommunication can not be concretely understood.Coupled with this is the complexity of the subject area.  To be literate in the area requires a broad scale of knowledge and theadoption of irregular rules to meet situational demands.  Given these factors it is proposed here that a hypermedia system(Marchionini, 1988) may be an effective tool for enhancing learning in this field.   From the student’s perspective hypermediamay prove to be a more efficient and efficacious means for learning a skill.  That is to say, the student may be able to learn moreabout the subject domain than could reasonably be provided in a traditional semester classroom course.  Moreover, each studentwill be free to learn topics that are more relevant to their needs.  This would provide the students with both concrete and affectivebenefits.  From an instructor’s standpoint, hypermedia instruction will help to supplement classroom training.  This in turn wouldhave the effect of decreasing instructional load, while at the same time increasing topic coverage.  This is of some importancein the current environment.  Course work in skill subject areas like telecommunication systems development and analysis requirethe coverage of quite a number of topics.  Because of time restraints, many topics receive only the most rudimentary attention,and this attention is given at the cost of other equally worthy topics.  Thus, the pace of the class and its subsequent attention totopic areas, suffers.  Classroom supplementary material can help to alleviate this situation.  In addition, traditional instructionin such domains requires numerous case observations.  Such cases are both timely to create and implement.  By delegating someof this instruction to a hypermedia system, the instructor is free to concentrate on other relevant topics. Many have asserted that hypermedia offers a number of advantages over traditional based instruction in ill-structureddomains.  These include:• Learner directed instruction;• Nonlinear access to instructional material; and a• Multi-modal instructional context   Positive results have been found in studies examining the ability of hypermedia to enhance the performance level of both lowability students and students with low knowledge in the domain (Barba & Armstrong, 1992; Bransford et.al., 1989; Mayer &Gallini, 1990).The chief requirement of the system described here (TNS) is that the courseware be available to the broadest segment ofthe learner (user) population.  This would imply the need for a course delivery platform that would provide shared access andcentralized storage of computer-based courseware or CBT.  Such a delivery system would necessarily be separate from thesystem platform used to develop the courseware.  The development platform would support the initial development and testingof the TNS application software.Development and Delivery Solution AlternativesThere are three different delivery alternatives that may be used to meet the system objective described above:1. Traditional CBT Development and Delivery2. Traditional CBT Development and CD-ROM Delivery3. Webpage Development and Web-based DeliveryWe use the third option to develop the system.  Courseware could be developed using the Hypertext Markup Language(HTML) and JAVA.  This would allow the course to be made available over the Internet.  This strategy would also increasecourseware availability by making it available to a wider range of audiences. This alternative would require that the developedsoftware conform to the standards required by HTTP protocol, and be bound to the capabilities of JAVA and HTML.  Moreover,it would suggest the need for a webserver capable of supporting simultaneous access of the courseware-1032-One of the most common hypertext system structure is the hybrid structure. These structures attempt to combine both thehierarchical design with some elements of network designs.  Typically, hybrid designs may take two forms: the directed acyclicgraph and the jump linear design.  The jump linear structure is quite similar to the tree structure in its use of anchoring nodesand branch tree structures.  However, in this design the user is not required to return to the anchor node.  Thus, the learner maychoose other paths.  In the directed acyclic graph topology, most but not all, nodes have a single point of entry.  In this mannerat higher levels of abstraction the acyclic graph structure appears similar to the tree structure.  However, at lower levels of thehierarchy the learner is permitted to reverse and even cross traverse subject nodes.  Thus, as shown in figure 3, this topologyprovides both instructional guidance and user flexibility.  TNS Instructional Architectural DesignThe goal of TNS is to provide broad range of instruction, that is both flexible to the instructional needs of the user, whileat the same time providing the needed level of instructional guidance.  For this reason the initial panel of TNS, the TNShomepage, will provide a non-linear gateway to all the resources included in TNS.  The homepage will provide access to the fourmajor categories of TNS resources: Course Instruction, Learning Resources, User Tools, and Instructor Tools.Course Instruction.The course instruction structural link will provide access to the course materials in TNS.  This link will allow the studentsto choose from an  instruction level menu.  This menu will link to the course topic menu, which will allow students to select thecourse they choose to pursue.  It is proposed that there be three different instructional mastery levels for each topic module orunit: Summary Overview, Beginner, and Advanced Instruction.    The summary overview course level will provide the readerwill the fundamentals and high level concepts of the subject matter.  This will allow a beginning student who wishes to gatheronly the most basic knowledge of an area to do so quickly.  This level of course instruction will rely on catagorial threads andindex access constructs to provide brief and concise information on the topic.  However, at the end of the overview the user willhave the ability to access more detail information.  As might be expected, the beginner course level will provide more in depthcoverage of the subject matter.  This level of instruction is proposed to support freshman classes and non-IS majors.  Thus, thislevel of instruction will rely on a hierarchical hypermedia topology and a guided tour access construct as a means for providingmaximum instructor control of the learning process.  This level will also rely on structural, i.e. menus and fold links, i.e. hotlinks, as the major associative links.  Access to other learning resources in TNS during subject content presentations will belimited to relevant multimedia video clips and the glossary in order to reduce learner disorientation.  In more critical topic areasa linear design will be used.  This will serve to ensure that the learner proceeds through the entire subject segment.  In addition,frequent student assessments, including sub-unit exams will be provided. The advance course level is geared towards seniors and graduate level IS majors.  While the beginner and overview levelsprovide conceptual knowledge, the advance level provides more detail conceptual and task related, e.g. applied, knowledge.  Thismastery level will use structural and allutive links to present topic matter within an index guided tour access construct.  Thus,this mastery level will provide the learner with the least amount of instructor guidance; allowing students to access other learningresources at will.  Other types of non-goal oriented, i.e. exploratory learning will be supported through use of other learningresources and user tools.   Based on these considerations, detailed tables are prepared that describe course content and unitorganization.ReferencesAvailable upon request from K. Bland (kbland@jewel.morgan.edu).

An Object-oriented Design for an Adaptive System to Augment a Telecommunication and Networking Systems (TNS) Course

https://aisel.aisnet.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1778&amp;context=amcis1998

An Object-oriented Design for an Adaptive System to Augment a Telecommunication and Networking Systems (TNS) Course

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

AIS Electronic Library (AISeL)