Evolving open learning environments using hypermedia technology

Abstract

A number of features of web-based hypermedia are identified as providing a suitable medium for the design of open learning environments. The underlying object-oriented architecture of hypermedia systems accords with the need for representational diversity of pedagogic mechanisms and the ongoing re-construction that an evolutionary approach to the design of learning activity demands. A web-based prototype has been constructed to represent aspects of the National English Board curriculum in diabetes mellitus. The design and development process tries to take account of features of the environment likely to influence or be influenced by the intervention. Quantitative and qualitative methods have been employed to enable an evaluation of the hypermedia design and its environment of use.