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AUTHOR Dong, Andy; Agogino, Alice M. TITLE Design Principles for the Information Architecture of a SMET Education Digital Library. SPONS AGENCY National Science Foundation, Arlington, VA. PUB DATE 2001-06-00 NOTE 10p.; In: Proceedings of the ACM/IEEE-CS Joint Conference on Digital Libraries (1st, Roanoke, Virginia, June 24-28, 2001). For entire proceedings, see IR 058 348. Figures may not reproduce well. Also funded by National SMETE Digital Library Program. CONTRACT DUE-0085878 AVAILABLE FROM Association for Computing Machinery, 1515 Broadway, New York NY 10036. Tel: 800-342-6626 (Toll Free); Tel: 212-626-0500; e-mail: [email protected]. For full text: http://wwwl.acm.org/pubs/contents/proceedings/d1/379437/. PUB TYPE Reports - Research (143) Speeches/Meeting Papers (150) EDRS PRICE MF01/PC01 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS *Computer System Design; *Design Requirements; Education; Educational Media; Educational Resources; Educational Technology; *Electronic Libraries; Information Systems; *Instructional Design; Instructional Materials

ABSTRACT This implementation paper introduces principles for the information architecture of an educational digital library, principles that address the distinction between designing digital libraries for education and designing digital libraries for information retrieval in general. Design is a key element of any successful product. Good designers and their designs put technology into the hands of the user, making the product's focus comprehensible and tangible through design. As straightforward as this may appear, the design of learning technologies is often masked by the enabling technology. In fact, they often lack an explicitly stated instructional design methodology. While the technologies are important hurdles to overcome, the report advocates learning systems that empower education-driven experiences rather than technology-driven experiences. This work describes a concept for a digital library for science, mathematics, engineering and technology education (SMETE), a library with an information architecture designed to meet learners' and educators' needs. Utilizing a constructivist model of learning, the paper presents practical approaches to implementing the information architecture and its technology underpinnings. The study proposes the specifications for the information architecture and a visual design of a digital library for communicating learning to the audience. The design methodology indicates that a scenario-driven design technique sensitive to the contextual nature of learning offers a useful framework for tailoring technologies that help empower, not hinder, the educational sector. (Contains 14 references.)(Author/AEF)

Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. Design Principles for the Information Architecture of a SMET Education Digital Library

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND Ottice ot Educational Research and Improvement DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS ----- EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION BEEN GRANTED BY CENTER (ERIC) O This docurnent has been reproduced as received from the person or organization D. Cotton originating it. O Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality.

TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES Points of view or opinions stated in this INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) document do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy.

By: Andy Dong & Alice M. Agogino

BESTCOPYAVAILABLE Design Principles for the Information Architecture of a SMET Education Digital Library Andy Dong Alice M Agogino Department of Mechanical Engineering Department of Mechanical Engineering University of California, Berkeley University of California, Berkeley 5138 Etcheverry Hall 5136 Etcheverry Hall Berkeley, CA 94720-1740 Berkeley, CA 94720-1740 +1 510 643 1819 +1 510 642 6450 [email protected] [email protected]

ABSTRACT This implementation paper introduces principlesfor the 1. INTRODUCTION information architecture of an educational digital library, principles Instructional technology and `e-learning' gain momentum that address the distinction between designing digital libraries for dailyaseducators andeducationalpolicy-makersstriveto education and designing digital libraries for information retrieval in incorporate Web-based learning strategies to improve education and general. Design is a key element of any successful product. Good achievement.In the United States, this momentum undoubtedly designers and their designs put technology into the hands of the benefits from former President Clinton's initiatives on closing the user, making the product's focus comprehensible and tangible digital divide advocated by the President's Information Technology through design. As straightforward as this may appear, the design Advisory Committee'. Congress has commissioned a Web-based education commission2 to set policy for leveraging the Internet as a of learningtechnologiesisoften masked by theenabling technology. In fact, they often lack an explicitly stated instructional vehicle for education. The IEEE Learning Standards Technology design methodology. While the technologies are important hurdles Committee3 works to develop standards and specifications to facilitate computer implementations of education and training toovercome, we advocatelearningsystemsthat empower components and systems. education-drivenexperiencesratherthantechnology-driven experiences. This work describes a concept for a digital library for However, the focus, whether in government, industry or academia, seems placed squarely on advancing the "technology" science,mathematics,engineeringand technologyeducation (SMETE), a library with an information architecture designed to part of instructional technology rather than "instruction." Learning meet learners' and educators' needs.Utilizing a constructivist technologies could be characterized as technology-focused, that is, model of learning, the authors present practical approaches to focused on the enabling technologies rather than tailoring their implementing the information architecture andits technology design to local educational practices. The bulk of the current set of learning technologies deliver tools needed to create, deliver, and underpinnings.The authors propose the specifications for the information architecture and a visual design of a digital library for manage on-line courses.More emphasis and effort is placed on communicating learning to the audience. The design methodology full-featured learning management systems and ever more complex indicates that a scenario-driven design technique sensitive to the instructional technology systems incorporating more content and more capabilities. contextual nature of learning offers a useful framework for tailoring Anecdotal evidence suggests that teachers and students are technologies that help empower, not hinder, the educational sector. often frustrated by these systems. The need exists for systems that Categories and Subject Descriptors place instruction at the core of design and technical functionality, to Computing MilieuxComputers and Education Computer distinguish them from systems that merely contain educational Users in Education contentbutwhosedesignandtechnicalfunctionalityis indistinguishable from a wide-array of others.We advocate a General Terms contextual design approach focused particularly on applying current Design, Human Factors learning research to instructional technology. A prototype platform and portal for a new instructional system Keywords based on this approach is being built for the science, mathematics, Science, mathematics, engineering, technology, education, engineering and technology education (SMIETE) community. [11] learning technology The mission of this instructional system is to create an environment in which educators and students work together as active learnersa public space for the teaching and learning of science, mathematics, engineering and technology as an integrative study. Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for The foundation of this instructional system is a digital library personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are of learning object resources. The digital library offers direct access not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior http://www.ccic.gov/ac/ specific permission and/or a fee. 2 http://www.hpcnet.org/webcommission JCDL '0 I , June 24-28, 2001, Roanoke, Virginia, USA. Copyright 2001 ACM I -58113-345-6/01/0006...$5.00. 3http://ltsc.ieee.org/

314 3 to and delivery of instructional resources through the establishment them unstructured access to the digital library is similar to an of a federation of representative SMETE digital libraries.The unguided visit to a "bricks and mortar" library.Pedagogical digital library promotes learning through personal ownership and structureis necessary for learning and education to happen. management of the learning process while connecting the learner Deciding which resources to use, and what information to extract, with the content and communities of learners and educators. that is, altering, rearranging or recomposing information, are among Content and services provided through the digital library will the numerous information processing tasks [13] associated with generally include multimedia courseware, digital problem sets and constructing mental models [8] that could be better left up to the exercises, educational software applications, related articles and educational user.The tasks of the digital library are to find the journals, and instructional technology services for educators and learning resources, supply useful tips on applying them to current students, both commercial and non-commercialall organized and learning goals, and surface information that would aid in the labeled for the purpose of education and instruction. decision to incorporate the learning elements.The following Layered on top of the content are various tools, such as search sections propose principles for applying pedagogical structure to the tools, learning object management tools, and community-building information architecture of an educational digital library in support tools, which leverage the educational content.These tools will of this constructivist view of learning. permit userstolearn,connect and managetheirpersonal 2.1 Information Organization educationalportfolio. The digitallibraryseeks to connect communities of educators and learners to a rich set of pedagogical Separating content and context, or content and learning processes, affords learners the flexibility of applying learning resources for SMET education.Educators engage intelligently in objects towards different instructional strategies to teach the same public discourse and debate about matters of technical importance. or related subject matter.One of the primary challenges of This combination of SMETE contents, services, and tools positions the digital library as a 'learning space' for learning science, information organizationfor educationisthe uncertaintyin knowing the cognitive models of the learner or educator. Studies in mathematics, engineering and technology. Direct access to a broad collection of SMET educational generative learning theory for science and technology [11] posit that learning is not necessarily limited to the manipulation of existing content and services presents simultaneously an opportunity and a cognitive structures but rather begets new associations for the source of frustration for the learner and educator.In order to learner. We are led then to the following principle. conceptualize and design a new instructional system, instructional Principle 1: Organize information to provide opportunities for considerations, not technology, must take center stage. Utilizing a students and educators to create, synthesize, manipulate or debate constructivist view of learning, we outline the specifications for an content rather than merely to passively receive instruction. informationarchitectureforthepresentationof educational resources in a manner that communicates education and instruction 2.2 Information Labeling to the educational user.Under this viewpoint, the information Using appropriate instructional strategies for a particular level design of the digital library should increase students' responsibility of learning and incorporating necessary conditions for learning for their own learning; they take control of their actions and presentation are significant components of success associated with a interactions and organize their own time for learning. At the same specific instructional delivery mechanism. The effectiveness of the time, the design should empower the educator to guide the student learning resource hinges on the type of learning undertaken, through this educational path.Whoever the user may be, the whether the pedagogical style is inquiry-based, project-based, peer- objective is the same: to assemble educational resources for the based, or model-based, among others.This leads to the second purpose of learning. The essence of the information architecture is principle specification. to devise interactions that let users achieve this goal. Principle 2: Label resources with pedagogical identifiers such Informationarchitecture[14]deals withthe design of as age group, teaching method, and academic standards to indicate organization, labeling, navigation, and searching systems to help educational uses. people fmd and manage information.This implementation paper introduces the grounding principles for the information architecture 2.3 Information Navigation based on instructional considerations for each of the objectives of Few would argue that the best possible instruction involves information architecture, that is, organization, labeling, navigation individualized treatments that differ in structure and completeness depending on the learning goals and ability of the learner. Research and searching. Based on theprinciples, we formulate an has shown that curriculum with highly structured treatments seem information architecturethat supportstheseprinciples. The to help students with low ability but hinder those with high abilities. principles are based primarily on constructivist theories of learning [3] The navigation scheme of the digital library acts as a proxy for with reference to information processing [1] as a model of mental cognitive tasks [7].A visual concept and reference technical curriculum in so far as how the digital library guides users through the task of finding learning elements. The implication for the implementation that exemplifies the information architectureis information architecture then is to balance prescriptive navigation presented. The paper concludes with plans for an assessment of the while allowing users ability to explore. Two individuals using the effectiveness of the architecture in meeting the design principles. same navigation should be guided to only the specific information 2. Learning: A Constructivist Viewpoint that a particular learner wants or needs in the appropriate manner A prevailing theory of learning, constructivism, asserts that and at the appropriate time. learning is based on students "constructing" their own knowledge Principle 3: Guide the collection and adaptation of learning by testing ideas and approaches based on their prior knowledge and elements towards individual learning goals. experience, applying these to a new situation, and integrating the new knowledge gained with pre-existing intellectual constructs. [8] 2.4 Information Search Information access environments, such as an educational digital A popular approach to implement digitallibrary search services is to utilize an existing full-text information retrieval library, offer students and educators opportunity to gain access to system such as Google. The primary deficiency, though, is that these "pre-existing intellectual constructs."Unfortunately, giving

315 4 these systems lack sufficient context for learning. The question that across the disciplines.Tools such as glossaries and thesauri needs to be asked is how to formulate a search that aids in personal could ease the referencing of such material. learning. The difference between finding a learning resource and Both students and educators emphasized community as an doing research for developing course curriculum versus merely integral component in the learning process. conducting an information retrieval task lies in the interpretation of relevance.Relevance in the sense of learning is much more Based on these findings, we identified the following high-level complex than as treated by standard information retrieval methods. user needs: A search for "solar system" could return numerous relevant Information Organization documents with high precision, defined in information retrieval Methods to organize the materials around personal terms, but not contain information addressable by a class of high context(s) rather than a prescriptive context. school physics students performing an inquiry-based study of Community resources for social network building in orbital patterns nor would it be useful for providing information particular to assist in discussion and synthesis of learning relevant to the specific learning context. resources. Educational objectives should be searchable and listed in the Information Labeling search results. The extent to which a learning element is relevant Educational labels to describe learning resources. correlates with how the learning element achieves a learning goal. Information Navigation This leads to the following principle. Learner information profile to improve adaptation of Principle 4: Optimize search to meet the interests, knowledge, learning elements towards educational goals. understanding, abilities, and experiences of the users in their roles Information Search as educators or students. Learning descriptors as search filters. 3. Methodology 3.2 Benchmarks of Existing Educational This information design methodology follows along the principles of "contextual design." [2] Contextual design suggests Digital Libraries that systems development should follow a deep understanding of Forthesecondphase, we comparedtheinformation the users' work, thereby explicitly defming the interaction of the organization, labeling, navigation and search of NEEDS and users with the system. We utilized several tactics for obtaining this IstERLOT5, two widely used educational digital libraries, on the task information: 1) a review of user needs provided by case studies high-level needs shown in Table 1. and user scenarios; 2) a simple benchmark of two existing, Table 1 Comparison of educational digital libraries prototypical educational digital libraries; and 3) user personas and task modeling. NEEDS MERLOT Information Organization 3.1 Analysis of Existing User Studies Methods to organize the No No An important first step in this process is gaining knowledge of materials around personal the educational objectives of learners and educators and what tasks context(s) rather than a they would undertake in the digitallibrary to achieve their prescriptive context. objectives.This knowledge was gathered from a review of use Community resources for Yes No scenarios from an evaluative case study of users [9] in the National social network building in Engineering Education Delivery System (NEEDS) [10] and user particular to assist in scenarios4 developed by the Digital Library for Earth Systems discussion and synthesis of Education (DLESE). Both of these studies centered on identifying learning resources. and clarifying users' (end-users such as learners and educators as Information Labeling opposed to catalogers and authors) needs regarding the functionality Educational labels to Yes Yes and behavior of an educational digital library and prototypical tasks describe learning resources. in utilizing the digital library's resources. Information Navigation The major findings from the above studies were: Learner information profile No No When userssearchforinstructionalmaterials(learning to improve adaptation of objects), they want to find materials that are useful and meet learning elements towards their needs. For educators, "useful" materials include labs, educational goals. exercises, lecture notes and primary materials. Educators also Information Search noted the desire for quality standards and peer review as a Learning descriptors as Yes filtering mechanism.For students, useful materials were Yes search filters. resources for papers or research. Faculty noted the importance of instructional and pedagogical 3.3User Personas and Task Scenarios labelingtounderstandsuccessfulcoursesandlearning Finally, we developed user personas and task scenarios these experiences. users might potentially undertake to reach their learning objectives. Given the broad array of disciplines represented by the We noted that finding learning resources using this digital library resources of the digital library, both students and educators represents but one of many tasks that a user might undertake to noted the need for cross-references to information that cuts satisfy their learning objectives.Further, we thought through how

4 Available at http://www.dlese.org/usecases/forum.html. 5 http://www.merlot.org/

316 the digital library might complement the user's existing learning A teacher wants to share her experience using a "mathlet" environment rather than supplantitwith avirtuallearning for plotting equations.The teacher uses the Comments and environment.That is, the digital library should enhance overall Reviews feature, shown in Figure 3, to attach a teaching use learner and educator productivity rather than enhance just the ability comment with the learning resource. The comment is sent to to search and retrieve learning resources. the author. Examples of the user personas are: 1) Sally is a 10th-grade student at an inner-city high 4. The Architecture school.Sally's favorite course is biology and would The primary driver for the information architecture of an like to become a doctor or veterinarian. education digital library is to facilitate a better way to accommodate 2) Tom has taught general science in junior high for over the task of retrieving learning objects that can be re-used for 10 years and would like to be rejuvenated. He has learning. A reference information architecture for a SMETE digital started to attend professional development workshops library, available for preview at http://www.smete.org/, is presented. where he has been introduced to new pedagogical techniques for teaching science. 4.1 Information Organization Tasks these personas might undertake include: The challenge here is to develop a personal collection or Student: learning portfolio to keep track of materials found, not necessarily The student has a homework assignment on "electrons." for convenience, but rather to assist the learner or educator in To complete the assignment, the student begins by browsing conceptualizing the material in a manner conducive to individual through the digital library collection of materials appropriate learning. Further, the collection can be shared to engage discussion for K-12 general science and mathematics education on between the user and the author(s) or contributor(s) of the resource "electron configuration." as well as with others interested in learning about the same subject A student has just gone on a field trip to an observatory. matter using the same learning object.The learning portfolio The student learns about solar winds and their effect on radio shown in Figure 1 is both a radiant experience and focal point for transmission. The student is not able to find materials on solar organizing material. As a secondary purpose, it allows the user to winds and thus posts a question to a "science buddy" about navigate through the space of digital library resources in a concept solar winds. space that is defmed by the user. Teacher: The folder metaphor is just one interface currently under A teacher is preparing a new lesson plan for a general development to assist users in organizing learning resources. Other science class. The teacher finds curriculum material. Instead interfaces, including concept maps [3] in which users create their of printing them out, he directs his students to the material on- own concept maps and organize materials according to the map, are line where they can work together on some experiments. An currently under consideration. example of this on-line personal collection is shown in Figure 1.

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4.2 Information Labeling The key goal in information labeling is supporting the discovery Eisenhower National Clearinghouse has completed a taxonomy of of educationresourcesratherthanmerely supportingthe mathematical concepts for K-I2 education.These thesauri are discovery of resources in general. The search results (Figure 2) being integrated into the information labeling of this educational surface educational use indicators such as age group, learning digital library. resource type and learning context through the use of the IEEE Learning Object Metadata (LOM). [6]While the LOM, and similarly the Dublin Core metadata in the description 4.3 Information Navigation of educational resources [5], do not currently make semantic- Since a learning object normally has several elements and allyidentifiablestatementsaboutthepedagogicalaspects requires instruction about the pedagogy, navigation (Figure 3) is required to guide users towards the adaptation and collection of ofalearningresource,informationindicatinghowthe learningobjectsassociatedwith learning resource can be integratedintoa curriculum can differentlearninggoals. bemadeavailablethroughtheuseofdomain-specific Navigation cues to "learning elements" lists the components of 'best practices' vocabulary. In the LOM, the tags the learning object with a brief description of the elements Educational.LearningResourceType, associated with the learning object. Cues to "pedagogy" contain Educational.TypicalAgeRange and information on how the user might integrate the material into curriculum including Educational.TypicalLearningTime references to past successful offer teaching and learning information that may aid in the implementations. discovery, retrieval and eventual use of the learning resource Ad-hoc on-line communities for review and assessment when populated with appropriate controlled vocabulary. That is, integrated into the search results and learning objects, cross-linked by labeling learning resources with information about how they by subject and description keyword(s), guide users towards might be used, the labeling supports better learning through better debating and synthesizing learning materials in collaboration with instructional design. others. By bringing in these discussions, learners and educators can capture issues and others' conceptual models to develop a Thesedomain-specificvocabulariesfordescribingthe shared view of the subject. educational use of learning resources are being developed in various communities. The Mathematics Association of America has completed a subject thesaurus for mathematical concepts and the

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4.4 Information Search In the "Find" mode (Figure 4), users apply numerous One of the important pieces of user feedback regarding the learning descriptors to direct the search engine towards particular search mechanism of the NEEDS digital library was the confusion learning object(s). A typical "Find" search might be, "Find the between "Search" and "Advanced Search," the former connoting courseware titled 'Interactive Frog Dissection." In "Research" usefulness to novice users of the digital library and the latter to mode, users conduct a broad search using subject headings, with advanced users. Instead, the difference between the two modes of the option of filtering the results by a set of learning descriptors. search is really the level of filtering, with "Advanced Search" The "Research" mode alsooffersthecapabilitytoview containing more learning descriptors as search filters.As such, courseware within a collection by subject headings, such as all we differentiate the search mechanisms in terms of assisting users "civil engineering" courseware from the "NEEDS" collection. In find materials with potentially more relevance to their education "Browse" mode, users conduct high-levelsubject searches levels, experience and knowledge. unconstrained,necessarily,byanylearningdescriptors. A more relevantdistinctiontosearchingforlearning Hierarchical browsing through subject keywords, visual browsing resources is the level of knowledge the user has of the SMET through an image database of multimedia learning elements, and concepts and how those concepts would typically be addressed. browsing by teaching method assists the user in conceptualizing at That is, an experienced person in a specific subject discipline a high level the type of resources available in the digital library. might use the Find feature to locate a particular learning object It is expected that users unfamiliar with a subject area would whereas a beginning student in the field might utilize the Browse begin by browsing, eventually using some of the navigational aids feature to locate learning objects within a more general subject and information labeling to inform more directed "Find" or category familiar to the student. "Research" to locate specific learning objects.

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5. Conclusions Assessment of user needs Theobjectiveof thisimplementationpaper wasto Formative assessment focused on improving services investigate the support of learning through the resources of a and features digital library and then translate those needs to the design of an Short and long term impacts of the digital library on the information architecture for an educational digital library.By SMET educational community including students focusing on the learning objectives of educational users, rather than how to enable a particular user interface or learning In this early stage of development, we are focusing our technology, the study establishes principles on how to introduce evaluation efforts on identifying user needs in order to ensure that features that focus the digital library on its educational goals. By the library design reflects those needs. The needs assessments understanding the motivations that lead individual educators and have been instrumental in the design of our site and are essential learners to utilize the resources of an education digital library, we to developing an accessible library that does not exacerbate the were able to obtain knowledge of how a larger population of growing digital divide. To better understand the needs of our learners and educators would use the digitallibrary. The diverse community of users we conducted in person focus groups information architecture principles present guidelines on how to and, this year, will implement on-line focus groups. We also design an education digitallibrarythatbettersatisfiesthe continue to survey our registered users on a regular basis as well information processing tasks associated with learning, particularly as specified samples within the larger population. inquiry-based learning. These principles enabled the design of a Our next steps will center on implementing user studies of various digital library for networked information discovery and retrieval users (e.g., students, faculty, K-12 teachers) interacting with the with education being the objective, a primary distinction from site. Here we will implement observation studies of users as well information retrieval in general. as coordinated surveys of users. Currently under parallel development is an Iritructional Questions guiding the user studies include: Architect6, an integrated Web-based development environment in Do the users interact with the site as designed? which learning objects can be assembled into instruction with a Are the users satisfied with the site? Do they find it methodforenablingthespontaneousformationof new easy to navigate? Do users find useful materials? What communities of users based on shared interests. Users may search hinders their use of the site? for learning objects using the digital library presented in this paper and download them into the Instructional Architect system. Do users prefer particular aspects of the interface design? Assessment studies are currently being conducted on a lead- user group. The evaluation plan for the information architecture To examine the short and long term impacts, we will conduct is organized loosely around three types of evaluation methods: more in-depth studies that focus on the expected outcomes associated with our goals. These studies will include tracking usage statistics and patterns across, between and among specific 6http://ia.usu.edu/ user communities as well as for the library as a whole. Metrics

320 9 associated with expected outcomes for teachers, students and in Simon, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale, New some cases courses, curricula and schools may be examined. Jersey, 1989. Particular attention will be focused on the impact on student learning. Studying the immediate and long-term impact of the [8] Larochelle, Nadine Bednarz, Bednarz, Nadine and library is a complex project requiring expertise from various Garrison, Jim, (Eds.), Constructivism and education, different disciplines. Collection of use data is currently underway, Cambridge, U.K., Cambridge University Press, 1998. and planning has begun with regards to long-term studies. [9]McMartin, Flora, "PreliminaryFindings from The primary impact the digital library may have on teaching 'Science, Mathematics, Engineering, and Technology and learning is to actively engage the participants in the creation Education' User Study Focus Groups." of shared conceptual understanding of science, mathematics, http://www.needs.org/engineering/info/papers/focusgr engineering and technology as an integrated study.By giving teachers and studentsaccesstolearningresourcesacross oup599/focusgroup599.pdf. disciplines with the flexibility to incorporate them into their own [10] Muramatsu, Brandon, and Agogino,Alice,"The personal educational goals, the digital library creates new learning National Engineering Education Delivery System: A opportunities for students and new ways to present materials for Digital Library for Engineering Education," D-Lib teachers. Magazine, April 1999, Vol. 5, Issue 4, ISSN: 1082- 9873. 6. References [11]Report of the SMETE Library Workshop, National [1] Atkinson, R. C., and Shiffrin, R. M., "Human memory: A proposed system and its control processes," In Science Foundation, July 21-23, 1998, http://www.dlib.org/smete/public/report.html. Spence,K. W., andSpence,J.T.(Eds.),The Psychology of Learning and Motivation, 1968, pp. 90- [12] Schaverien, L and Cosgrove, M., "A biological basis 191, Academic Press. for generative learning in technology-and-science Part I: A theory of learning," International Journal of [2] Beyer, Hugh and Holtzblatt,Karen,"Contextual Science Education, December 1999, 21(12), 1223- Design," Interactions, February 1999, 30-42. 1235. Chen, H.C., Houston, A.L., Sewell, R.R., and Schatz, [3] [13] Simon,H.A.andFeigenbaum,E.A.,"An B.R.,"Internetbrowsingand searching:User information-processingtheory of some effectsof evaluations of category map and concept space similarity, familiarization, meaningfulness in verbal techniques," Journal Of The American Society For learning," Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Information Science, 49(7), 1998, 582-603. Behavior, 3, 1964, 385-396. [4] Chu, Larry F., and Chan, Bryan K., "Evolution of web [14] Wurman, Richard Saul, Information Anxiety, New site design: implications for medical education on the York, Doubleday, 1989. internet," Computers in Biology and Medicine, 28, 1998, 459-472. [5]Dublin Core Metadata Initiative Education Working Acknowledgements Group, http://dublincore.org/groups/education/. The National Science Foundation funded this research work under Grant #DUE-0085878 and program solicitation DUE #00- [6] IEEE Learning Technologies Standards Committee 44 for the National SMETE Digital Library Program. The authors Learning Object Metadata base document available at would like to acknowledge the members of the SMETE.ORG http://ltsc.ieee.org/doc/wg12/L0Mdoc2_4.doc. Alliance for their invaluable feedback during the development of the information architecture. This research is part of an ongoing [7]Klahr, David and Kotovsky, Kenneth, (Eds.), Complex Information Processing: The Impact of Herbert A. collaboration to build a National SMETE Digital Library at www.smete.org.

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