SCORM Defined
SCORM stands for Sharable Content Object Reference Model.
SCORM is a communication standard that allows learning content to talk with learning management systems (LMS). By using SCORM, a course can tell the LMS what the learner scored on a quiz, the last page completed in a course, or other user interaction data.
A Brief History of SCORM
The US government developed SCORM so computer-based federal and military training would be created to a defined, interoperable standard. The US federal government employs millions of people. Training millions of people involves many different courses, vendors, and, platforms to achieve its training and development needs. With no defined standard, the courses, vendors, and platforms developed their own solutions for course communication and reporting. These solutions were not interoperable (didn’t work together) and not sustainable.
In 2000, The Department of Defense through a program called the Advanced Distribution Learning (ADL) Initiative developed SCORM to respond to this challenge. Using SCORM allowed content to be developed around a standard regardless of agency, vendor, or platform.
SCORM Today
SCORM has continued to evolve since its inception. I started using SCORM around 2005. At that time, SCORM 1.2 was the most popular and available SCORM version. In practice, there are two major implementations of SCORM being used today: SCORM 1.2 and xAPI.
SCORM 1.2 has continued to be extremely popular even though the standard is 20 years old. Almost every major Learning Management System and Content Authoring tool supports SCORM 1.2. It has remained popular because it is a mature standard that is pervasive throughout the learning technology ecosystem.
xAPI is a more recent iteration of the SCORM standard. It allows for more customized approaches to capturing learner data. It is more flexible than SCORM 1.2, but that flexibility requires a little more design work to capture custom data.
I’ll provide a more detailed comparison of SCORM 1.2 and xAPI in a future post. But if you’re just getting started with SCORM, SCORM 1.2 is probably the best place to start. As your requirements and reporting sophistication increase, xAPI may be the next step. You can also contact Tang Technology for a free 30-minute consult on the needs of your organization and we can help guide you in the right direction.