Boston College

Creating Engaging Multimedia Course Content

Through the Use of A Database Driven Template

EDUCAUSE 2007

Elizabeth ClarkInstructional Design and eTeaching Services,

Boston College

The Problem

• Faculty members have lots of content: text, images, audio, video, but too often they are presenting it to students in a linear, disconnected fashion.

The Problem

• This seems at odds with:– The goals of the educator– How we think and learn

“We Need A Better Book”

• Malleable material

• Visual learning• Maximizing class

time• Student

ownership

The “Rome Project”

• Case study: History of Roman architecture from 1370 - 1700

• Main idea: A walking tour of Rome• Complexity: The variety of factors that

influenced why, where and when buildings were erected

The “Shelley Project”

• Case study: One cultural moment• Ideas: Movement across media• Complexity: Tension and

reinforcement

Envisioning the site: Content

• Requirements:– Multi-platform use– Small file size

• Formats:– Text – Images– Audio and video

Envisioning the site: Structure

• Multi-purpose access:– Content relationships– Directed progression– Keyword searching

• Dynamic interface– User-driven– Clear navigation

Moving from the Specific to the General

• How do we move from creating time and resource intensive projects toward building an application that can be used and sustained by many faculty, one that is usable across a variety of disciplines?

• Can we turn this into a template?

MEMEO

• My Educational Multimedia Explorer Online

• Atoms, widgets and templates• The technology:

– PHP/MySQL– Flash Remoting– AJAX

MEMEO

• Building an effective user interface

– Basic feature: single items are added to a MEMEO instance and the metadata determines where it will “live”

– What Rome gave us: Timeline and map elements– What Shelley gave us: Topic and slideshow elements

MEMEO

• What we gained:

– Comparison function was improved– Tags added: This allows users to cross reference

items in the overall presentation– More functional search: It’s contextual, so if an item

exists in multiple areas, it will show in the search that way.

MEMEO

• What we gave up:

– Music isn’t attached to objects as in the Flash-based Shelley presentation

– Integration with Library databases– Filtering on the map

Adding Data

Adding Data

Adding Data

Adding Data

Where To Go From Here?

• Integrated user authentication• HTML or Drupal “wrapper”• Integration with other databases and

systems on campus• Extending content development to students• Sharing this with other academic institutions

Contact Information

Elizabeth ClarkDirector

Instructional Design and eTeaching Services

Boston College

clarkeq@bc.edu617-552-6826