Installing a Learning Object to the D2L Environment

13 Aug 2020 by Murat Kahveci
Online Teaching

This tutorial is for the D2L environment demonstrates how to import and use a learning object prepared in the SCORM 1.2 standards. You may read more about what is a SCORM here.

Importing the package

SCORM 1.2 packages are shipped with .ZIP extension. Log in to your D2L course and follow these steps to import a new SCORM package.

Download the demo package

Download the demo SCORM package

  • Remarks:
    • Flash based simulations will not be used.
    • HTML5 based simulations will be preferred.
      • They should be compatible with all modern devices including tablets and phones.

Upload to D2L

  • Navigate to Course Administration > Import / Export / Copy Components > Import Components and click Copy All Components
  • Select SCORM package from your desktop. In this demonstration, the file name is test-package.zip. See Figure 1.
Figure 1
Figure 1. Import screen: File selection.
  • Click Import All Components. Figure 2 shows the normal progress.
    • Remarks:
      • D2L supports file sizes up to 1 GB.
      • This demo uses a file with 283 KB. Very practical!
Figure 2
Figure 2. Import screen: Processing.

Viewing the SCORM content

  • Click View Content to access the Content tab.
    • Figure 3 shows that a new menu item is added to the Table of Contents.
    • When the menu item is clicked, the content appears in the main block with a SCORM object sign.
Figure 3
Figure 3. SCORM content appears in the Table of Contents

Accessing the content

  • Click the link title General Chemistry Lab I ▹ Interactive

  • Figures 4 - 8 shows the D2L snapshots of various views in D2L

    Figure 4
    Figure 4. Text based content.

</figure>

<figure class="image-with-shadow" style="max-width: 800px;">
<img src="/images/blog/lcz/7.jpg" alt="Figure 5" style="width: 100%;">
<figcaption><small><em>Figure 5. Simulation.</em></small></figcaption>

</figure>

<figure class="image-with-shadow" style="max-width: 800px;">
<img src="/images/blog/lcz/8.jpg" alt="Figure 6" style="width: 100%;">
<figcaption><small><em>Figure 6. Fill in the blank type activity. Feedback is immediate for learning. Not graded.</em></small></figcaption>

</figure>

<figure class="image-with-shadow" style="max-width: 800px;">
<img src="/images/blog/lcz/9.jpg" alt="Figure 7" style="width: 100%;">
<figcaption><small><em>Figure 7. SCORM quiz. Graded, no feedback. Testing the knowledge gain.</em></small></figcaption>

</figure>

Figure 8
Figure 8. Upon SCORM quiz completion, a item is created in the `Grades` module.

Benefits

  • All of the content is free for students.
  • Easy to set up an experiment in D2L.
    • All logical sequences with content and activities will be followed by all sections.
    • Any content type like .pdf, .docx, .xlsx can be embedded.
  • Content can be updated as needed.

Limitations

  • Videos are hosted by YouTube.
    • Panopto sometimes imposes strict share limitations.
    • Copying movies from one course to another often produces broken links.
  • We don’t make new simulations so we cannot change them.

    • This particular demo uses a simulation from PhET Interactive Simulations

    • I have been following PhET Interactive Simulations since it has started and ACS lists PhET Interactive Simulations in the first place of their list (see Figure 9).

Figure 9
Figure 9. ACS lists PhET Interactive Simulations in the first place of their list.