Applying Web Services to define Open Learning Environments Miguel Ángel Conde, Francisco J. García Computer Science Department. Science Education Research Institute (IUCE). GRIAL Research Group. University of Salamanca e-mail: {mconde, fgarcia}@usal.es María J. Casany, Marc Alier Services & Information Systems Engineering Department, UPC - Campus Nord, building Omega, Barcelona, Spain. e-mail: mjcasany@lsi.upc.edu , marc.alier@upc.edu Abstract—Evolution of learning processes is almost always linked to social changes and/or technological changes. One of those processes is eLearning, which is involved in the changes brought about by trends 2.0. This new tendencies consider the user, socialization and collaboration as the main important elements and this must be considered also in eLearning contexts. But today learning environments do not facilitate this approach. They are focused on the institutions or courses, not in the student as a key element of the learning process, as well not always provide elements of socialization and collaboration. In order to avoid these drawbacks, and by using service oriented architectures over learning management systems, new elearning environments could be defined. This paper will propose an architecture that would enable learning platforms evolve in that direction. Keywords: PLE, LMS, Web services, Moodle 2.0, eLearning, SOA I. INTRODUCTION Learning processes are living social elements and therefore they are changing continuously. The evolution of learning processes may be due to new sociological or technological trends, or simply due to pedagogical [1]. The eLearning is one of those evolutions, and is almost completely assimilated into the educational environments. This learning model has relied on technology without obtaining, in many cases, the expected benefit, as if it has occurred in other areas. Despite this eLearning has experienced an extraordinary growth over the last years, learning paradigms; technological solutions, methods and pedagogical approaches have been developed, discarded and adopted. We have reached a point in time when most of learning institutions have adopted the use of Learning Management System (LMS) software, either from commercial vendors or Free Open Source Communities. LMS have reached the balance to meet the structure and (traditional) ways of schools, universities and other educational institutions. These systems provide students and teachers a set of tools for improving learning processes and managing them. However, the LMS have not achieved the expected improvements due to: 1) The tools provided are not used properly and often are used as mere spaces to publish courses [2], 2) The LMS restrict opportunities to collaborate on student learning and promote social constructivism not limited to a period of time (i.e. academic year) [3], 3) They are focused on the course and the institution rather than the student and their needs [4]. Besides this should be noted that online learning does not end with the LMS, but there are plenty of online tools to supplement and improve it. Therefore, new applications must be taken into account, such as the search applications, news applications, location- enabled applications, content repositories, forums, blogs, calendars, online games, virtual worlds, etc. That is, the new initiatives arising from Web 2.0 [5]. Given this situation will be necessary to evolve the LMS to its integration with contexts that include new technological trends, to provide social characteristics and be focused on the student, these contexts are personalized learning environments (Personal Learning Environments, PLE) [6] and also are considered as Open Learning Environments. This will be the main objective of the present project. Throughout this article firstly PLE and its relationship with 2.0. tools will be described. Later we talk about a possible deployment by using service-oriented architectures. Finally the proposed architecture will be exposed. II. NEW LEARNING CONTEXTS LMS are widespread. The learning institutions provide to the teachers and learners a set of online learning tools embedded into the LMS by default. The LMS is also used as a channel to gather other services like access to portfolios and content repositories. But outside of the LMS there are also plenty of online tools that can be useful sources of information, ways of collaborating and sharing: Search, News, Maps, Documents and Spreadsheets, Public forums, Calendar, Translation, Images, Videos, Microblogging. Social networks, Bookmarking, Wave, Online Games, 3d Virtual worlds... All these services are already being used for educational purposes, but only by advanced users. And usually the usage of these online tools is not integrated within the scope of what we could refer as "virtual classroom". Because is happening outside of the radar of the learning institutions and sometimes even the teacher. Let's consider this -not so fictional- scenario: a subgroup of students of a class are using tools like Instant Messaging, Wikis, Wave or participating in a Social Networking site, while and sometimes for doing homework. The students engaged in the usage of all these online tools might get better 2010 Workshops on Database and Expert Systems Applications 1529-4188/10 $26.00 © 2010 IEEE DOI 10.1109/DEXA.2010.36 79