Navigating the Educational Space with Hypercourseware

Abstract

Navigation is a spatial metaphor for the activity of steering a course through hypermedia. When hypermedia is used in the context of education, navigation takes on a number of critical functions related to learning (e.g., acquisition, generation, and organization of knowledge) as well as the service functions related to the database (e.g., retrieval, storage, and database management).

This article attempts to articulate the concept of navigation in hypermedia for education and to unpack the complexity of the metaphor in the educational context. Principles of good hypermedia and interface design are proposed based on a review of relevant literature pertaining to navigation, menu selection, and information retrieval. In the course of this discussion, a number of tools are suggested that may serve as navigational aids, retrieval aids, organizational aids, and planning aids.

Finally, the article considers the application of these ideas to the design of a hypermedia environment for interactive/collaborative learning in a fully integrated electronic classroom. An environment called HyperCourseware is described which acts as an infrastructure supporting the materials and methods of education. HyperCourseware instantiates in hypermedia form the traditional materials of education such as the syllabus, lecture notes, exams, and class roll as well as interactive methods for group discussion, exchange of ideas, student polling, feedback, and collaborative group note taking. Navigation in HyperCourseware involves the traversal of shared course materials as well as personal notes as they are generated in the hypermedia space. Furthermore, navigation must be considered as traversal by individual students, by the instructor, by the class as a group, and by various collaborative combinations.