Developing a Visualisation Tool for Tour Planning

Стандартизація в галузі розробки засобів е-навчання приносить значний ефект, даючи змогу інтегрувати без жодних змін і модифікацій електронні освітні ресурси, що були створені для одних програмних середовищ, в інші. На сьогодні основним стандартом інтеграції засобів е-навчання поки що залишається SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model), створений ініціативною групою ADL (Advanced Distributed Learning) ще в 2001 р., який з багатьох причин вже не відповідає сучасним вимогам: може працювати тільки в браузері, не підтримує роботу з мобільними застосунками в режимі офлайн тощо. Тому в 2013 р. ADL запропонувала новий стандарт xAPI, що регламентує спосіб збору та збереження в розташованих у мережі сховищах – Learning Record Store (LRS) – даних про формування компетентностей осіб у рамах їх формальної, неформальної та інформальної освіти впродовж життя. Однак цей стандарт не зміг замінити SCORM через свою надмірну гнучкість. Для подолання цього недоліку ADL у 2016 р. було прийнято окремий профіль специфікації стандарту xAPI, що одержав назву cmi5, який чіткіше формалізує алгоритм взаємодії між призначеною одиницею (Assignable Unit – AU) навчального контенту, LRS, і системою управління навчанням (Learning Management System – LMS). У статті проаналізовано відмінності нового стандарту cmi5 від його попередників – SCORM і xAPI; наведено актуальний перелік програмних засобів, що підтримують cmi5, а також виконано тестування роботи з cmi5 у програмі створення електронних курсів iSpring Suite і хмарній системі управління навчанням SCORM Cloud. Зроблено порівняльний аналіз вмісту пакетів SCORM, xAPI та cmi5, а також операторів, які записуються в LRS при виконанні цих пакетів. Наведено огляд плагінів для роботи зі SCORM, xAPI та cmi5 у LMS Moodle та результати їх тестування.

The human mind needs order to understand anything and, in this respect, standards are essential because they impose order on the world. More specifically, standards are bringing great new benefits to the e-learning realm. For instance, by adhering to standards, courseware builders can construct components completely independent of the management systems under which they are intended to run—that’s interoperability. There is a tough struggle nowadays to find the most appropriate specification for learning content and to assure it is fully operative across the existing LMSs (Learning Management Systems) in the market. In that authors view, SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model) is coming afloat, outplaying most —if not all— its competitors. For that reason, the authors have been using SCORM learning objects to manage their course in Moodle for their students of English at the University of Alicante, obtaining so far satisfactory results. The authors’ purpose in this article is twofold: on the one hand, they give an account of the problems they have met using SCORM in Moodle and how they have solved them. On the other, they explain the guiding aims of their Language Blend, which broadly said are the following: to set up a standard in language learning by means of a framework, wherein e-learning and in-person lectures merge strategically so that the benefits of both are enhanced.

The sharable content object reference model (SCORM) is a set of specifications and guidelines for the representation and operation of asynchronous distance learning. Since it was announced in late 1990s, the reference model has been used by software developers and academics in the development of authoring tools, learning management systems, and repositories for distance learning content. To date, most e-learning systems have been based on multimedia and Web technologies on personal computers. Our project, Hard SCORM, advances the field by implementing an integrated system which allows learners to read SCORM-compliant textbooks using multimodal multimedia devices. Hard SCORM employs a pen-like optical character reader device (called Hyper Pen) as an input mechanism. A computer, a personal digital assistant, or a cellular phone can be used for user behavior supervision using the hard SCORM machine. With an authoring tool, specially designed tags are printed in textbooks and recognized by hyper pen for user navigation control. In this way, users can read hardcopy textbooks in a traditional manner while the process of reading conforms to the SCORM specification. Part of the implemented system (Pocket SCORM on PDA) received the 2005 Brandon Hall Excellence in Learning Awards. The system has also been used by an airline company for online security checking and a high school for online mobile learning

E-learning standards ensure interoperability and reusability of learning contents. Learning objects that are standard conformant allow a learning management system (LMS) to import learning objects and track user learning progress more easily. This article provides a comprehensive approach complete with both a procedure and a software tool for generating standard conformant learning objects based on the Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM). The tool is meant to enhance the productivity and effectiveness of e-learning developers.

The sharable content object reference model (SCORM) has become one of the important specifications forcontent packaging and platform development in open and distance learning (ODL). SCORM-compliant learning objects(SCLO) areknowledge repositories that have been meta-tagged for SCORMcompliance.SCLO can be easily interoperated among different learning management systems (LMS) without being tied to a single content provider or authoring tool. The content can last longer because it is easier to justify ongoing compatibility with standard content. The purpose of this research is to examine student acceptance of SCLO. The involvement of students wasimportant for a successful content delivery process. Therefore,students'acceptance behavior should be assessed as this reflects whethertheywill eventually adopt SCLO in their learning. Data were collected through Davis's extended technology acceptance survey instrument. The data collected werefurther analysed and evaluated. The results of thisstudy are useful for instructors and course designers with respect to the use of SCLO in their respective courses or anycontent deliveryprocess.

While it is often argued that technology could act as a change agent and transform educational practices, individuals, communities, government and society holding their own ideological beliefs limit such a liberalisation of the educational system. To show that the use of educational technology is part of a dialectical struggle this article explores the: current use of technology in the classroom; development of standards and approaches to learning technology; and the use of computer and video games. The design, development, integration and use of technology in the classroom is driven by individual and institutional ideologies that support current hegemonic constructions maintained through observation and control systems. The development of standards for learning management systems (for example the Sharable Content Object Reference Model and the associated Learning Object Metadata Standard) underpin the concept of Reusable Learning Objects (RLO). The conceptualization, development, deployment and use of RLOs is ideologically driven and has little to do with contemporary ideas of learning and everything to do with fundamental and totalitarian ideologies of instruction. The blended approach to learning, where technology is introduced into existing courses where appropriate, sees technological objects (such as digital information, discussion boards, and chat sessions) as an additional component to existing courses. The use of technology in such a way does not allow for the re-conceptualisation of existing ideological practices and therefore limits educational transformation. Computer game technology could be used as a powerful tool to support learning. However, many supporters of the use of games in education argue for the use of simulations that are either ideologically suspect (for example the use of game software used to train military personal as a useful educational device) or based on model-using rather that model-building. An analysis of successful computer games shows that players are presented with either realistic environments that include complex multifaceted characters involved in richly textured narratives or are designed to support male fantasies (both erotic and authoritarian), inculcate self-discipline (especially through reflex), include control-and-monitoring (preparing workers for a global economy) and are gender exclusive. This article argues that technology can only be used within specific idiosyncratic, homological and inclusive ideologies that in most cases reproduce the past into the future, which is making real a neo-liberal dream. South African Journal of Higher Education Vol. 21 (6) 2008: pp. 655-671

The need to ensure flexibility, compatibility, interoperability and reduce costs of production and maintenance of resources can be obtained with the use of internationally recognised specifications as Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM), IEEE Learning Object Metadata (IEEE LOM) or Instructional Management System-Learning Design (IMS-LD). In this way, the research aims to verify whether a development model of Units of learning (UoL) based on open source online tools for authoring and execution of UoLs, that meet the criteria of usability and without deep knowledge of programming language by developers provide effectively increased implementation or the re-use of UAs complete or parts in different Electronic Learning Systems (ELS). For this, we intend to conduct a survey of authoring tools or editors and players to perform an analysis of competitors in order to identify the potential, general operating characteristics. Thus, to perform the surveys will be used as collection instruments: questionnaires and interviews with samples from groups of users and developers of educational content. Already the evaluations of the tool developed will be carried out by groups of users that include samples of all those in potential, in order to ensure the production of reusable content. Therefore, it is expected that the authoring tool and your player can assist in the development of UoLs for different ELS from a lean and simple semantics, which facilitates and ensures interoperability, changes, adjustments, maintenance and reuse of the UoLs.

Sustainable tourism, unlike conventional tourism, explicitly strives to maintain economic, environmental, and social sustainability in tourist destinations. Saipan, the capital and the largest island of the chain of Pacific islands known as the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), is a tropical destination that heavily relies on the tourist industry as a source of income. When analyzing the trends of tourist arrivals from the top three countries that account for the majority of tourist arrivals in Saipan-China, Japan, and Korea-the necessity to implement sustainable tourism in Saipan becomes clear. This article forecasts tourism demand, which is one of the main factors in determining sustainable tourism on a small island. Analyzing both long-term and cyclical trends in tourist arrivals assists budget-constrained policymakers and related organizations in implementing sustainable tourism. Therefore, forecasting accuracy is essential in tourism policy and planning. The tourist arrival data obtained from Marianas Visitors Authority’s official Japanese website are made into a time series for Chinese, Japanese, and Korean visitor data from 2006 to 2016. Given the various time-series forecasting models, we employ simple but powerful forecasting techniques, such as ARIMA and ETS to control for the possible seasonality and trend in our tourism data. Using these forecast methods, the tourist arrival data is used to predict the future trends of tourist arrivals in Saipan for the next twelve months. The performance of our forecasting model in this study is evaluated based on the five measures of accuracy, as measured by comparison with actual tourism flows: mean error, mean absolute scaled error, mean percentage error, mean absolute error, and mean absolute percentage error. A comparison of the two popular forecast techniques in this study shows that the ETS model statistically outperforms the ARIMA model in terms of various measures of accuracy. A practical implication of this finding is that the ETS approach should be used when forecasting tourism demand for small islands. We predict the visitor arrivals from China, Japan, and Korea to Saipan by using the better model. The estimated 80% and 95% intervals for the number of tourist arrivals by the ETS model are presented in this study. The upper (lower) bound is the maximum (minimum) value of the estimated tourist arrivals. We find strong evidence that the tourist arrival trend for Korean visitors to Saipan will increase in the short run; although, the Chinese and Japanese tourist arrival trends seems to be stable, except for Japanese tourist arrivals in August. Nonetheless, with such an intense demand for Saipan’s natural resources, sustainable island tourism becomes necessary. Our estimated result is useful to practitioners in the sense that they are able to prepare for carrying capacities and the means of destination management on Saipan. Proper management for maintaining the island environmentally, economically, and socially requires the preservation of indigenous culture, local quality of life, natural resources, and economic stability while accommodating the demands of arriving tourists. It is crucial to preserve the assets of Saipan in order to maintain and improve its economy. Thus, our time series modeling for forecasting the number of visitors becomes necessary to develop overall economic, environmental, and social sustainability in the island. An interesting addition to implementing sustainable tourism in Saipan is the idea of maintaining a “cap” on the number of incoming tourists visiting the island. Perhaps, with more research on Saipan’s environment, specifically an estimate of how much of the island’s resources tourists exhaust and how much the island can withstand the aforementioned, this “cap” could be practical to prevent perpetual damage to Saipan’s biodiversity, resources, culture, and economy. Along with this idea, knowing the minimum number of tourists needed to sustain Saipan’s necessities is valuable.

The designer of a subject was involved in creating a learning management system for use by 1400 students, in several countries with varying delivery modes, educational requirements and different technology infrastructures. The learning management system described currently consists of a CD-Rom, a Web site and a textbook. The product is utilised not only by the learner, but also as a support to the facilitators of the learning. Database concepts need to be adopted to ensure that the subject stored resources acquire the attributes of a relational database. A number of advantages are provided by way of storing educational components in a Web site as reusable objects. The system is a work in progress. There will be a resultant reduction in the redundancy of knowledge components of the subject and an improvement in the production time for online courses. This paper will discuss the process involved in the development of this learning management system.

The new model of stereotactic radiosurgery system, Gamma Knife Perfexion, allows automatic selection of built-in collimation, eliminating the need for the time consuming manual collimator installation required with previous models. However, the configuration of sources and collimators inside the system does not permit easy access for the verification of the selected collimation. While the conventional method of exposing a film at the isocenter is useful for obtaining composite dose information, it is difficult to interpret the data in terms of the integrity of each individual source and corresponding collimation. The primary aim of this study was to develop a method of verifying the geometric configuration of the sources and collimator modules of the Gamma Knife Perfexion. In addition, the method was extended to make dose measurements and verify the accuracy of dose distributions calculated by the mathematical formalism used in the treatment planning system, Leksell Gamma Plan. A panoramic view of all of 192 cobalt sources was simultaneously acquired by exposing a radiochromic film wrapped around the surface of a cylindrical phantom. The center of the phantom was mounted at the isocenter with its axis aligned along the longitudinal axis of the couch. The sizes and shapes of the source images projected on the phantom surface were compared to those calculated based on the manufacturer's design specifications. The measured dose at various points on the film was also compared to calculations using the algorithm of the planning system. The panoramic images allowed clear identification of each of the 192 sources, verifying source integrity and selected collimator sizes. Dose on the film surface is due to the primary beam as well as phantom scatter and leakage contributions. Therefore, the dose at a point away from the isocenter cannot be determined simply based on the proportionality of collimator output factors; the use of a dose computation algorithm is required. Scatter and leakage dose contributions from neighboring sources were calculated and found to be 6.3% (ranging from 4.5% to 7.4%), 16.7% (12.5%-19.3%), and 66.6% (38%-78%) for the 4, 8, and 16 mm collimators, respectively, at the centers of the source images. The measured average dose on films with 16 mm collimators agrees with the dose model of the treatment planning system to within 1.0%. The average doses on the film were 24.0, 60.8, and 186.2 cGy for 4, 8, and 16 mm diameter collimators, respectively, when the machine was set to deliver a reference dose of 100 Gy to the center of an 80 mm radius spherical dosimetry phantom. A method of simultaneously capturing and analyzing the panoramic images of 192 cobalt sources has been developed to verify the source and collimator configuration of GK systems. The method was extended to verify the dose calculation model of the treatment planning system by comparing the measured doses on the panoramic film images and the corresponding calculated doses. The method presented can play a significant role in comprehensive commissioning and routine quality assurance testing of the Gamma Knife systems.

The highest mountainous tourism destinations in the world receive few numbers of tourists both domestic and international. Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest mountain in Africa is not exceptional. This is because mountains are famous as adventure destinations due to the associated risks during trekking the summit. Consequently, only risk-taker tourists trek mountains. The objective of this study is to profile attractions in Mount Kilimanjaro’s altitudinal gradients to attract adventurous, acrophobic (fear of heights), and leisure tourists using a mixed-method approach. The results revealed that each altitudinal gradient harbours unique attractions. At an altitude of 1800 -2800masl, leisure, and acrophobic tourists experience endemic forest flowers like ‘touch-me-not’ or impatiens‘and viola, and diverse wildlife species. Between 2800 and 4000 masl, floristic tourists enjoy giant groundsels, such as senecio and lobelia and the Shiraplateau. At 4000 -5000masl, where semi-adventurous hope to experience nothing, the study found attractive rocks with unique shapes like a cathedral, turtle, mushrooms, and captivating striped Zebra-like rocks. Finally, above 5000masl, the adventurer tourists experience dazzling stars at night, the snow in the tropics, and the summit. The study concludes that the diversification of attractions is likely to draw a variety of tourists, thus, boosting the overall number of tourists. Therefore, in order to increase revenue generated from tourism, tourism planners should market mountains as not only adventurous but also leisure destinations.

This research aims to design and develop a learning management system and learning model based on digital storytelling in the digital learning ecosystem, to study the learning achievement and assess the digital emotional intelligence of the student teachers before and after implementing the model, and to study satisfaction towards the learning management system and model. The research found that the learning management system and the learning model based on digital storytelling in the digital learning ecosystem consisted of the learning management system which consisted of the learner, the instructor and the admin, the digital storytelling learning model in the digital learning ecosystem; the digital learning ecosystem consisted of the Biotic Component and the Abiotic Component. The average score of the student teachers' learning achievement after implementing the learning management system is significantly higher than before implementation. The average score of digital emotional intelligence was at the highest level. The satisfaction towards learning management system based on digital storytelling learning in the digital learning ecosystem was at the highest level.

This chapter examines the guidelines for the leisure and tourism planning process and outlines the rational comprehensive decision-making process as a framework for planning and policy-making. The process of strategic planning is considered initially, followed by a brief examination of some official guidelines for planning recently published in Britain and Australia. The main part of the chapter discusses the overall planning process, in the context of the rational-comprehensive model. Finally, the process of land-use planning and its relevance to leisure and tourism are discussed.

The purpose of this community service activity is to improve teacher pedagogical competence in integrating learning models in a Learning Management System (LMS)-based project in ICT-based elementary schools. The method for implementing the community service activity uses training which includes the stages namely 1) Conducting Competency Analysis, 2) Conducting Student Characteristics Analysis, 3) Constructing material that is in accordance with student characteristics but still on the essence, 4) Compiling LMS, 5) Implementing the developed digital LMS. The number of participants in this community service activity were 15 elementary school teachers of SD ICT Al-Abidin and 15 teachers of SD Ta'mirul Islam in Surakarta City. The evaluation instruments used were pre-test and post-test which were analyzed descriptively. The result of this service activity is a training on integration of learning models in Learning Management System (LMS)-based projects that can improve teacher pedagogical competence. This was shown by more than 80% of the participants, namely teachers who were able to understand knowledge about the concept of Learning Management System, learning models, TPACK, integration of learning models. The positive response was shown by the teachers who looked enthusiastic and active in discussing and designing learning models that were integrated into the Learning Management System.

A learning management system is a web-based software application that is used for the documentation, administration, tracking, reporting and delivery of training programs and educational courses. It is an efficient and effective way to give valuable information to the students in a short time. With the evolution of e-learning, the learning management system is widely adopted in the education sector as well as in corporate market. Thus, it became a valued target for attackers to focus their attacks on LMS platforms. Most of the popular learning management systems available now a day don’t pay enough attention to the security mechanism and that gives opportunity to intruders to gain unauthorized access by manipulating the security gaps and breach into the system. The result is information leakage, unwanted data deletion or modification and compromised integrity of the data. The aim of this research paper is to focus on the need of security concerns and to provide a solution that can make the learning management system secure from any possible potential threats and attacks. In this paper, a complete multi-layered security model is proposed. The implementation of proposed model will provide a very secure environment for any learning management system.