Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Area9 and LearnSmart

I have been doing a bit of consultancy work over the past few days and during this work I have been looking at e-learning and competency management tools. Much of these tools are not really what my client is looking for but I just wanted to share two of the tools I came across that might be useful to somebody.

Area9
http://www.area9learning.com/
Area9 are a Danish company specialising in simulation based e-learning. There are two domains it primarily works in - sales/customer services and device skills. These areas allow Area9 to demonstrate two completely different types of simulation learning. The sales/customer service where you must use soft-skills such as inter-personal and decision-making skills to sell or satisfy a customer need and the device analytical and operational skills where you must solve a simulated problem using device embedded software. The tools also claim to have some advance learner diagnostic tools that report on the competency level of learners. Learner diagnostics is then use to identify where and when remediation is needed for learners.

McGrawHill - LearnSmart
http://www.mhhe.com/learnsmart/index.html
LearnSmart is McGrawHill's adaptive learning platform. The system is built on three principle functions; assessment of learners knowledge, adaptation of assessments based on the learner's perceived strengths and weaknesses and personalisation of curriculum based on student knowledge and learning styles.

LearnSmart was built in co-operation with Area9. One thing I like about LearnSmart is that it allows the learner to give a confidence value (no idea, unsure, think I got it, easy!) for his or her answers which can then be used to calculate the learners competency in a given knowledge area.

No comments: