Semantic wiki powers e-learning portal

A new e-learning portal for higher education powered by semantic wikis will be launched by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) next week.

The portal has been designed using open source semantic web technologies to provide an information repository and reference database around e-learning assessment developments for the education community.

The portal has developed out of the e-Framework Reference Model for Assessment (FREMA) project, which began in 2005 to help people in higher education to build systems for e-learning. FREMA exists to develop a reference model for Assessment systems that focus upon the creation, execution and recording of electronic assessments.

Developed by Dr David Millard and Dr Gary Wills at the University of Southampton's School of Electronics & Computer Science (ECS), the new FREMA portal will allow users to search and update information on work funded through the project.

"We started to develop the portal based on traditional web development methods, designing a website with a database at the back-end," Dr Millard told IT PRO.

"But when it got the point of building mechanisms for users to add their own materials and information, the open source semantic wiki software we've used instead seemed to offer a more simple solution."

He said the FREMA portal would enable users, regardless of their technical ability, to add resources representing various aspects of Assessment in higher education such as information on standards and funding. "But it can be queried like a database," he added.

In this way JISC, which will maintain the portal, can better track the progress of its investments, while those looking for funding or for information on complimentary projects can share information about gaps and trends in their work in a structured online environment.

Dr Millard said the wiki contains capture mechanisms to make sure only registered users can access or update information, while it prompts users to record their work according to a suggested semantic ontology and so build on the framework fields of reference as well as expand the portal's use as a knowledge base.

The FREMA portal will be launched at a JISC e-Learning programme meeting on 11 October.

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