Feature-Rich Learning Management Systems for an Interactive Age
As the economic disaster tightens the budgets of organizations and businesses worldwide, more are turning to online training and learning management systems to handle their training.
As the demand for LMS systems and online education increases, e-learning software also matures.
In many ways, LMS technology is beginning to resemble gaming software, with an increase in interactive and exciting features.
E-learning modules that feel game-like and interactive are growing in popularity in many professional circles.
Some organizations and universities have made plans to integrate, or are already integrating such software into their LMS training systems.
And why shouldn’t they?
EMarketer estimates that 24 percent of the 34.3 million million users under 19 years old participated in a virtual world at least monthly in 2007, a figure that is predicted to jump to 53 percent by 2011.
As teenagers grow more accustomed to navigating virtual worlds, their understanding of different interfaces and interactions will help them use the same technology in an academic or professional context.
Still when you think of virtual worlds, you may think of teenage gamers.
Nevertheless, a number of companies have discovered that virtual worlds are a useful learning tool.
Virtual worlds permit students to carry out tasks that might not be possible in the physical world due to circumstances including personal, financial, locational or other difficulties.
A virtual world, much like a learning management system, allows educators and trainers to share videos, simulations, and other media with students.
Using an avatar, students can also interact with each other, or perform tasks to reveal knowledge.
“Serious game” virtual worlds are used in professional and academic education to teach everything from frog dissection to filling a cavity.
When used wisely, online tools like “serious games” and LMSs allow students to interact with learning content to an extent that traditional e-learning courses never quite matched.
With a feature-rich LMS, audio and video material can be created including simulations, demos, screen recordings, podcasts, and more.
The bad news is that most “serious games” are still under testing for professional use, and those on the market are pricey or not quite as sophisticated as other software options.
Though “serious games” are still developing slowly, learning management system software providers are stepping up their game to offer a greater fun factor, in order to compete in an increasingly engaging online education world.
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