LMS and LCMS: What‘s the Difference?
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The attached diagram published in the IDC report, The Learning Content Management System: A New E-Learning Market Segment Emerges illustrates how an LMS can launch courses developed by an LCMS and incorporate LCMS performance measurements into reports. |
IDC‘s report The Learning Content Management System: A New E-Learning Market Segment Emerges explains: “LCMSs and LMSs are not only distinct from one another, they also complement each other well. When tightly integrated, information from the two systems can be exchanged, ultimately resulting in a richer learning experience for the user and a more comprehensive tool for the learning administrator. An LMS can manage communities of users, allowing each of them to launch the appropriate objects stored and managed by the LCMS. In delivering the content, the LCMS also bookmarks the individual learner’s progress, records test scores, and passes them back to the LMS for reporting purposes.”
Differences and overlap
Both an LMS and an LCMS manage course content and track learner performance. Both tools can manage and track content at a learning object level, too . An LMS, however, can manage and track blended courses and curriculum assembled from online content, classroom events, virtual classroom meetings and a variety of other sources. Although an LCMS doesn’t manage blended learning, it does manage content at a lower level of granularity than a learning object, which allows organizations to more easily restructure and repurpose online content. In addition, advanced LCMSs can dynamically build learning objects based on user profiles and learning styles. When both systems adhere to XML standards, information is passed easily from the object level to the LMS level.
The following chart, based primarily on research conducted by Brandon Hall, summarizes the capabilities and differences between the two systems.
LMS |
LCMS |
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Who benefits? |
All learners; organization |
Ccontent developers; |
Provides primary management of |
Learner performance; learning requirements; learning programs and planning |
Learning content |
Manages e-learning |
Yes |
Yes |
Manages traditional forms of training, such as instructor-led |
Yes |
No |
Tracks results |
Yes |
Yes |
Supports learner collaboration |
Yes |
Yes |
Includes learner profile management |
Yes |
No |
Allows HR and ERP systems to share learner data |
Yes |
No |
Schedules events |
Yes |
No |
Offers competency mapping/skill gap analysis |
Yes |
No |
Includes registration, prerequisite screening, and cancellation notification |
Yes |
No |
Creates test questions and test administration |
Yes |
Yes |
Supports dynamic pretesting and adaptive learning |
No |
Yes |
Supports content creation |
No |
Yes |
Organizes reusable content |
Yes |
Yes |
Includes workflow tools to manage content creation process |
No |
Yes |
Develops content navigation controls and user interface |
No |
Yes |
LCMS close-up
IDC defines an LCMS as a system that creates, stores, assembles and delivers personalized e-learning content in the form of learning objects. Though an LMS manages and administers all forms of learning within an organization, an LCMS concentrates on online learning content, usually in the form of learning objects.
A learning object is a self-contained chunk of instructional material. It typically includes three components: a performance goal (what the learner will understand or be able to accomplish upon completion of the learning), the necessary learning content to reach that goal (such as text, video, illustration, bulleted slide, demo, task simulation), and some form of evaluation to measure whether or not the goal was achieved.
A learning object also includes metadata, or tags that describe its content and purpose to the LCMS. Metadata may include information such as author, language, version level, and more. In the white paper "Meaning, Metadata and E-Learning," author Dave Feasy of Eyepopping Design predicts,“With its increasing importance, we’re likely to experience a metadata explosion mirroring the information explosion it seeks to expiate. Managing the growing body of metadata will soon become a field unto itself. Hopefully, these new systems will not be named LMMS.”
So how are learning objects used to create content? An LCMS stores learning objects in a central repository for instructional designers to retrieve and assemble into personalized courses. This benefits developers and learners because traditional courses tend to contain more content than any single learner can absorb or needs to absorb about a topic. By breaking course content into learning objects and serving them up on an as needed basis, content developers can deliver just-in-time and just-enough learning. The end result is increased productivity because employees aren’t wasting time wading through irrelevant material.
While LCMS capabilities vary, key components include
The downside of the LCMS proposition is that it takes a great deal of foresight, planning, and skill to design effective learning objects--even when templates and examples are provided. Designers must think in a non-linear fashion and have a fair understanding of all the contexts in which an object might be needed or used. For example, if a learning object is taken out of context or presented with insufficient supporting information, it can do more harm than good. Some courses, such as those required for safety or certification programs, are required to cover a specific set of topics in a certain order and should not be broken apart.
To be sure, learning objects--and LCMSs--are a fixed part of the future, but they will likely always coexist with other forms of learning, such as mentoring, learning by doing, and instructor-led training.
LMS close-up
An LMS provides a single point of access to disparate learning sources. It automates learning program administration and offers unprecedented opportunities for human resource development. It identifies the people who need a particular course and tells them how it fits into their overall career path, when it’s available, how it’s available (classroom, online, CD-ROM), if there are prerequisites, and when and how they can fulfill those prerequisites. Once learners complete a course, the LMS can administer tests based on proficiency requirements, report test results, and recommend next steps. In that capacity, LMSs are instrumental in assuring that organizations meet rigid certification requirements in such vertical markets as healthcare, finance, and government.
Look for these capabilities in an LMS:
Integrating LMSs with LCMSs
A good LMS provides an infrastructure that enables a company to plan, deliver, and manage learning programs in any format it chooses. It will support multiple authoring systems and integrate easily with the leading LCMS systems. In its role as a catalyst for the overall learning environment, an LMS can integrate LCMS learning objects via technical specifications and standards and assume responsibility for all content management, including delivery and tracking, storage in a content repository, assembly and reassembly of content objects, incorporation of content objects into blended curriculums, and tracking learner progress through courses.
The key to integration success is an open, interoperable approach. Currently, leading LMS and LCMS suppliers are launching certification programs that proactively address compatibility issues and ensure interoperability between their products. While time-consuming and expensive for the suppliers, certification programs shield customers from integration hassles or having to settle for patchwork solutions from suppliers who try to do it all. The certification approach gives buyers the freedom to choose both the LMS and LCMS that best meets their needs.
Object level management has been around forever and solves a myriad of IT problems, but it’s not a panacea. Indeed, one analyst employs the following metaphor to illustrate the function of an LCMS. Traditional courses are bags of jelly beans, learning objects are the beans inside the bag, and LCMSs are systems that open all the bags, pour the beans into one big jar, and put descriptive tags on each bean so they can be repackaged into new bags on demand.
The question remains: Just because the technology exists to manage your e-learning content at the bean level, will it have a significant impact on productivity? Can you solve the need for just-enough learning other ways? LCMSs aren’t an inexpensive proposition. Before you invest, ask whether the problems they solve are the problems you care about.
Published: December 9, 2002
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来自: alien > 《knowledge management》