Educational overview

The purpose is to describe educational or pedagogical characteristics of resources. This includes the following:

Interactivity level - the level of interaction with the resource (e.g. very high or low); controlled vocabulary that cannot repeat; see detailed documentation for this element
Interactivity type - the type of interaction with a resource, active, expositive, mixed; controlled vocabulary that cannot repeat; see detailed documentation for this element
Content standards - a desired level of student achievement; controlled vocabularies with multiple entries allowed; see detailed documentation for this element
- National Science Education Standards - content standards relating to science
- Geography standards - content standards relating to geography
- Math standards - in the framework but search and cataloging not provided yet
- Technology standards - in the framework but search and cataloging not provided yet
- AAAS benchmarks - in the framework but search and cataloging not provided yet
Process standards - assessment of student ability to problem solve, connect, analyze, communicate, reason and apply ideas and concepts from instructional programs; controlled vocabularies with multiple entries allowed
- Math standards - in the framework but search and cataloging not provided yet.
Teaching standards - a desired level of educator knowledge, literacy and understanding in the methods of teaching science; controlled vocabularies with multiple entries allowed
- National Science Education Standards - search and cataloging not provided yet
- Technology standards - search and cataloging not provided yet
Resource type - the nature, category, function or aggregation of resource content with an emphasis on how the resource may be used in the classroom, professional development or in an informal educational setting ; required metadata with a controlled vocabulary and multiple entries allowed; see detailed documentation for this element

Audience information - as a group it encompasses the following characteristics:
- Grade range - the appropriate grade range or context for users of the resource; required metadata with a controlled vocabulary; see detailed documentation for this element
- Typical age range - (use when informal education is chosen for grade range) - the age of the typical intended user, that is, the age of the grade range; see detailed documentation for this element
- Tool for - an intermediary that mediates between the ultimate beneficiary of the resource and resource itself--usually some form of teacher or trainer that uses the resource as a tool; controlled vocabulary from GEM with DLESE additions; see detailed documentation for this element
- Beneficiary - a recipient of the instruction or information of the resource for the specified grade range; controlled vocabulary from GEM with DLESE additions; see detailed documentation for this element
- Instructional goal - the desired learning outcome that results from interacting with the resource for the grade range specified; free text; see detailed documentation for this element
- Teaching method - ways of presenting instructional materials or conducting instructional activities
  ( appropriate teaching methods for the grade range specified); controlled vocabulary from GEM with DLESE additions; see detailed documentation for this element
- Typical use time - the typical amount of time for a particular grade range to interact with the resource; see detailed documentation for this element

Note: the audience element is built around the grade range element; audience may be repeated as a group only; individual items cannot repeat within the group except teaching methods.

As an example of how audience may be used, please refer to the resource DataStreme Atmosphere which is an online, distance learning, college credit course for K-12 teachers taught by K-12 teachers. But it is often used locally by teachers with their students.

Audience 1

Grade range - Graduate or professional
Tool for - Teachers
Beneficiary - Teachers
Teaching method - Distance learning

Audience 2

Grade range - High school
Tool for - Teachers
Beneficiary - Students
Teaching method - Small group learning

Why these education fields?

This section provides a very brief justification of why the educational fields above are part of the ADN metadata framework.

Interactivity level and interactivity type - DLESE started its metadata history using the IMS metadata framework. IMS has this field. Another significant metadata framework, IEEE-LOM has it too. It remains in ADN because the NSDL-DC metadata format uses the IEEE namespace which includes this element. Therefore, to maintain a interoperability with NSDL on this concept, interactivity level and interactivity type are part of ADN. Additionally, the ADN co-development partner, ADL (Alexandria Digital Library), expressed interest in these fields.

Content standards - In the DLESE Community Plan (pages 9-10), a use case mentions interfacing to standards. The report also mentions that DLESE can play a central role in national implementation of quality Earth and space science education in the K-12 arena by providing materials, networks and training. Indicating resources support educational standards is one method to accomplish these goals. Thus, content standards, most notably the National Science Education Standards (NSES) and the geography standards are present in the ADN framework. Plus, the Dublin Core metadata framework has the concept of tying standards to resources but it use a very strong link of 'conforms to.' The ADN co-development partner, NASA Earth Science Enterprise, wanted this field as well.

Process standards and teaching standards - The motivation for including teaching standards is that DLESE can be a resource for professional development of educators. Secondly, while content standards address content proficiency, associating process standards with resources addresses process as well (e.g. does the student arrive at the correct answer based on correct reasoning or process). This idea is in the DLESE Community Plan (pages 9-10). The ADN co-development partner, NASA Earth Science Enterprise, wanted these fields as well.

Resource type - Major metadata frameworks like GEM, Dublin Core, IEEE-LOM, IMS and NSDL-DC contain resource type. Additionally, this idea is also expressed in the DLESE Community Plan (page 18). It can be an essential characteristic to narrowing search and determining a resource's context of use (e.g. lesson plan versus course). The ADN co-development partners, ADL (Alexandria Digital Library) and NASA Earth Science Enterprise, wanted this field as well.

Grade range - DLESE is an education library. Grade information is essential for classifying resources. The ADN co-development partners, ADL (Alexandria Digital Library) and NASA Earth Science Enterprise, wanted this field as well.

Typical age range - DLESE started its metadata history using the IMS metadata framework. IMS has this field. Additionally, the ADN co-development partner, NASA, develops many materials for informal education. This means the ADN metadata field of grade range says 'Informal education.' Because of this, NASA wishes to express age level in order to indicate resources are appropriate for six and seven year olds as opposed to thirteen and fourteen year olds in an informal educational setting.

Tool for and beneficiary - Early cataloging experience showed that many DLESE resources are intended to be used by different people to benefit different people. DLESE investigated to see how other groups handle this dilemma. GEM acknowledges it by creating the fields of tool for and beneficiary. DLESE adopted these fields and uses some of the GEM controlled vocabularies. The IEEE-LOM framework combines these two concepts into a single field called intended end user role with the dominant user listed first. This single combination is confusing to catalog to and probably would not be easily understood in search results. Thus, the GEM ideas are in the framework over the IEEE-LOM idea. Qualified Dublin Core has these concepts as well with their audience and mediator fields. NSDL uses the qualified Dublin Core namespace but with a very simple vocabulary. A crosswalk because the adopted GEM fields and NSDL keeps DLESE interoperable for these concepts. The ADN co-development partner, NASA Earth Science Enterprise, wanted these fields as well.

Instructional goal - Since DLESE adopted the GEM fields of tool for and beneficiary, instructional goal is also adopted from GEM. This provides a more complete pedagogic description of a resource. The goal is to provide library users with the instructional goal of the resource without having to go to the resource itself. Therefore, comprehension of the resource is improved. The ADN co-development partners, ADL (Alexandria Digital Library) and NASA Earth Science Enterprise, wanted this field as well.

Teaching method - The same ideas for instructional goal apply here too. Additionally, IEEE-LOM has a similar concept except that it is described as comments on how the learning object is to be used. The ADN co-development partner, NASA Earth Science Enterprise, wanted this field as well.

Typical use time - DLESE started its metadata history using the IMS metadata framework. IMS has this field. It remains part of the ADN framework because early cataloging experiences showing DLESE resources are intended to be used by different people to benefit different people means the time interacting with a resource may be completely different for different groups. For example, a resource may take 1 hour with seventh graders but only 20 minutes with ninth graders.

Further information

To see more detailed information about individual metadata fields, the allowed number of field occurrences, controlled vocabularies or XML structures, please refer to the desired version number of the framework on the left-side navigation menu and then go to the See in XML section.

Last updated: 2004-09-28
Maintained by: Katy Ginger (support@dlese.org), DLESE Metadata

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