Learning Objectives for E-Learning Instruction

This chapter presents a new concept called learning objective for an e-learning instructional model that combines objectivist and constructivist learning theories. A learning objective is composed of learning objects, a concept inherited from the object-oriented paradigm, which permit to reuse educational content across different e-courses that are accessible over the Internet. The instructional model proposed structures the educational contents on the basis of the concept of learning objective, mapping constructivist principles to the instructional design by means of a more pragmatic approach that focuses on the principles of moderate constructivism. Collaborative activities are also included to create a social environment that acts as a scaffold for collaborative learning and dialectical constructivism.