SCORM and other Course Package Formats

Course Packages are important, because they allow the course to speak with the Learning Management System and track the users progress. If we were to upload a course without any tracking system, then your company or organization would have no way of knowing if a user has completed a course.

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The most well-recognized Course Package Format is the SCORM package. It was first invented in the year 2000 and many LMS systems still rely on SCORM 1.2, released in 2001 for all their courses.

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Others have adopted the newer SCORM 2004 package that comes in various iterated versions, called editions. Each edition introduces minor features and fixes issues. The latest is the SCORM 2004 4th edition, released in 2009.

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All of the above Course Package Formats are adequate and useable for tracking if a user completes a quiz or passes and fails the course – but for anything else, they just can’t do it satisfactory.

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This is where xAPI and cmi5 comes in. xAPI was launched in 2013 and introduced a myriad of features for tracking the user experience in e-learning courses. In 2016 cmi5 is introduced and it is our preferred Course Package Format at Mindspark.

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Cmi5 simplifies the xAPI format and is ideal for use with Learning Management Systems. With cmi5 it is easy to track the entire journey of the user with built-in statements in courses published through Articulate Storyline. Furthermore, we can set up tracking on specific events as well.

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This means, that if there is a final quiz of 10 questions and users are reporting they are struggling with it, that we can go into the logs and see which specific questions they are having issues with. We can then analyze the questions and figure out why they are struggling: Perhaps the question is asked in weird way or perhaps there has not been enough educational material in the course covering the question that was asked.

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It’s also possible to check which specific parts of the course users may spend longer on than intended or if there are parts that the users have found a way to skip.

Not all Learning Management Systems can handle all the various Course Package Formats, there are others that we haven’t covered in this article, so it’s important that the most modern format that your LMS can handle is selected.

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If you have questions about Learning Management Systems or Course Package Formats, then do not hesitate to send a mail to contact@mindsparkelearning.com or use the form below.