EDID6510 Assignment 1 1

Assignment 1

LMS, LCMS and CMS a Critical Analysis

By

Nyeisha George-Minott

Presented in Partial Fulfilment of

EDID 6510 learning and Knowledge Management Systems

Date of submission: June 11, 2017

Email: nyeisha.georgeminott@my.open.uwi.edu

University: University of the West Indies (UWI) Open Campus

Course Coordinator: Dr. Laura Gray

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LMS, LCMS and CMS a Critical Analysis

Imagine what it was like before the emergence of technology within the educational and

corporate landscape. Imagine writing on slate tablets with chalk in the classroom and information was

kept only as long as the slate was not wiped clean of its contents. Imagine office typewriters being used

to create pages upon pages of information. This however, notwithstanding gave rise to the alarming

collection of paper in filing cabinets in schools and universities, and businesses accumulated massive

training manuals that soon became obsolete. Then there was the invention of the personal computer.

That launched the management of content from storage/floppy disks, CDs and hard drives to servers

and cloud storage. Managing classes, corporate training and content became a chore and management

systems became necessary. The world welcomed the Learning Management System (LMS), Content

Management system (CMS) and Learning and Content Management System (LCMS). This paper will

examine the history of the systems, analyze the functions and features, and do a comparative analysis of

the systems.

What is the difference between an LMS, LCMS and CMS?

How does one distinguish each of these systems from the other? This simple analogy will help

illustrate the difference.

Now imagine a bakery store front, the style of the door, the

window design, paint color etc. are unique to the store. A content

management system (CMS) determines how the store front

(website/user interface) appears. Designers can manipulate the

appearance with minimal effort.

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When someone enters the bakery they come upon the display

case. Here the Learning Management System (LMS) has courses and

content much like a bakery display. Content is presented/displayed in a

meaningful organized fashion. Staff (teachers/instructors/facilitators)

interact with students/trainees (customers) concerning the items (videos,

files, lessons, etc.) seen in the store. Interactions here refer to online meetings, discussion forums,

assignments, tracking, delivery, and assessments etc.

Behind in the kitchen the bakers and pastry chefs (a team of

instructional designers, Subject matter experts, e-learning authors, and

project managers) are developing,

creating, packaging, sorting and tagging

items (content for courses) for use and reuse in the store. E.g.

question banks, training simulations. This is how the Learning and

Content management system (LCMS) functions.

Take a step out back to the cold storage facility. The CMS also functions as a cold storage unit

housing and maintaining content, making them available for future use.

History of the Systems

Prior to the arrival of the computers and the dot com era, learning management systems were

unheard of. In the 1920s to 1930 early psychologists, theorists and educational technologists was

beginning to study human and animal learning. Their research leads them to create theories of learning

and methods that could one day automate learning. They were testing theories of learning by creating

models and other instruments. With the advent of Motion pictures, it was thought that films could be

used for instruction and soon televisions were a common fixture in the classroom.
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During World War II it became necessary to tailor instruction to accommodate the thousands of

new recruits using video training guides. It was during this time that the role of and instructional

technologist emerged. By the 1950s and 1960s the military were rapidly integrating instructional

systems development into their standards training procedures. Also during that period Programmed

instruction, IBMs thinking machine and B.F. Skinners testing machine made their mark in history. PLATO

(Programmed Logic for Automatic Teaching Operation) was launched and was designed as a computer-

based system for instruction and is considered to be the first LMS. By 1970 to early 1980s the personal

computer made it appearance and the Havering Computer Managed Learning system is one of a few

systems that emerged.

Then came the invention of the World Wide Web, the internet and the first web browsers, and

an explosion of new technologies blossomed. Many of the first learning management systems made

their appearance between 1990 and 2005. As can be seen in the timeline in figure 1, systems such as

First class, Topyx, angel, Blackboard, Moodle and Desire2learn, are a few Learning management systems

to emerge at that time. Within that same time frame a number of Content Management systems came

on stream. More and more businesses and institutions made an online presence and, generated large

amounts of content that required a new type of system. CMSs such as Slash, Typo3, Drupal, Apache

roller, WordPress and Weebly made their appearance in the Early 2000s.

Considering the need for an integrated system, designers sought to merge the better of two

worlds. They integrated Learning management features with content management features which

morphed into Learning and content management systems. The redundancy of creating content and

knowledge assets was soon streamlined and in the early 2000s LCMSs such as Elogic, configio, Docebo,

Schoox and Bridge emerged.

Analysis of functions and features

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LMS

As a learning environment platform for e-content the LMS has been used in the K-12 setting,

higher education, business and enterprise. There is a slight differentiation in LMSs used for education

and LMS for business. The LMS for Education (blackboard, Moodle, Edmodo), these systems have similar

functions and features. The operations include but not limited to user registration, tracking, recording

data for users, reporting and analysis. Traditional classroom tools such as calendars and attendance

record are integrated. Also activities and features such as assignments, gradebook, chat, forum, files,

quizzes, lessons, wiki, messaging and email are also available. Teachers and students interact

synchronously and asynchronously.

The LMS for Businesses such as Mindflash, Docebo and Litmos are used to train employees.

Employers can import training materials, invite trainees to the course and track their progress.

Employees can train at their own pace while companies save the cost of hiring training experts, cost of

travel, and experience minimal disruption to workflow. [ CITATION Mor16 \l 2052 ]

CMS

Most organizations and individuals want to have an online presence, whether it is a blog site, a

wiki or a facebook page. Some organization use Content management systems to enhance their

presence online through digital marketing. Educational institutions likewise see the benefit of a CMS to

host their schools website, blogs and other content. Individuals also create personalized websites that

can be hosted on CMSs. These CMS solutions such as, Wordpress, Drupal and Weebly are used to

author, organize and store content which can be anything from records, invoices, Excel spreadsheets,

word documents or even a social media feed. Having been introduced to using Weebly as part of a

course requirement, I found that it was relatively easy to set up a website, choose a theme and

customize to my liking without the need for knowledge in HTML, though that is an asset.
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Content Management Systems fall into two major groups of CMSs emerged Web content

Management and Document Management. Web CMS or W-CMS helps create published and

unpublished content within a website that is intended for public distribution. The W-CMS platform can

facilitate a blog and an online store, among other types of Web-based content. Document management

or DMS on the other hand deals, for the most part, with electronic or printed content that has not been

created for public distribution. Some examples would be internal documents that help a company

function (e.g., company reports), or client-facing documents that facilitate transactions, such as contracts

and invoices.(Westfall, 2017)

LCMS

Knowledge assets are the main end products of the LCMS. This authoring environment allows for

collaborative authoring and template building. Content can be produced once and can be repurposed for

different output formats. Think of the analogy made earlier in this document, the bakers and pastry

chefs can create one main cake batter for example, which forms the base for a variety of cakes from

chocolate to carrot to cheese cake . Multiple collaborators can create content and learning objects then

stores and organize them for reuse and repurposing. This allows for flexibility in learning content

creation and rids organizations of costly duplicate development (Westfall, 2017)

My Institution/Organization

The Antigua and Barbuda International Institute of Technology (ABIIT) is a tertiary level

institution that offers in-class, hybrid and online courses at the associate degree level. A Learning

management, content management, academic administrative and e-mail system form part of my

institutions daily operations.

Moodle is the LMS of choice and ABIIT has been using this since 2008. The institution has gone

through several versions of Moodle over the years, and has witnessed the features that dwarfed and
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blossomed to the current system in use today. With the upgrades and recent plug-ins, ABIIT instructors

have access to the Respondus Lockdown browser for monitoring test taking, Turn-it-in software to check

for plagiarism and Open Meeting to host our live meeting sessions. Gamification is also included as

games such as hangman, crosswords, Sudoku, Millionaire and snakes and ladders can be added to a

course to enhance student engagement.

As for the content management system, ABIIT uses WordPress to manage and maintain its

website www.abiit.edu.ag and have recently done a redesign. Sonis web is the academic administrative

system that manages course scheduling student registration, grade reports and transcripts. The e-mail

services is hosted by Microsoft Office 365 which gives access to several other cloud based services and

applications such as calendar, tasks, OneDrive, SharePoint, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, access, yammer,

flow etc.

Cloud based (SAAS) vs Installed

The current trend is towards cloud based systems. Early systems were built for installation on

servers and hosted on site by and organization/institution. This was a resource heavy operation and is

costly to maintain. Now you find systems such as Edmodo, Loudcloud, Schoology, Schoox, and Bridge

offer cloud based services, for free or for a small fee.

Proprietary Vs Open source

Depending on their needs, an organization can choose a proprietary system or an open source

system. Propriety software has set restrictions on use and be very expensive, whereas open source

software is freely available for users to use as is or to change, improve. Open source software has

become acceptable as a cost-effective alternative to proprietary software so much so that s is reported

that the increased adaption of open source software has caused a drop in revenue to the proprietary

software industry [ CITATION Eva15 \l 2052 ]. Determining the software institutions and businesses use
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includes considering the cost of maintenance, system support, and upgrading and future software

development.

Security

More and more institutions and organizations are on the alert for nefarious activity and the

safety of it resources and online activities. Hacking and viruses are still a major concern, as these have

caused major disruptions to services. A relatively new security threat is that of ransomware. Institutions

and organizations data, records and files have been held hostage by hackers and cybercriminals in an

attempt to cash in on the ransom to release these files.

Conclusion and looking ahead

The competitive landscape of the LMS, CMS and LCMS is a growing market. Though evolving

from humble beginning these systems are evolving into a robust series of software, each with its own

unique purpose and customers. Thanks to the vision of psychologists, theorists and educational

technologist early attempts at managing learning and content lead the way for the systems we see

today; systems that are open sourced, cloud based, more accessible, upgradeable and secure with better

support for student/trainees learning.

Educational institutions will continue to capitalize on the technologies that mimic the traditional

classroom and businesses can tailor their training programmes to their organizations needs. As future

developments take place the LMS will adopt more operational functions and features than just curating

content and accessing content with better communication systems. Soon the CMS will host more robust

web content and become even more user friendly and LCMSs can make collaborating on content and

knowledge assets a less tedious affair. This is the next generation of learning, content and creative

environments the world anticipates in the future.

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References

Blackboard Company. (2006). Blackboard Academic Suite Brochure. Retrieved from:

http://library.blackboard.com/docs/as/bb_academic_suite_brochure_single.pdf

Dalstrom E., Brooks C.D., & Bichsel, J. (2014 September). The Current Ecosystem of learning Mangement
systems in Higher Education: Student, Faculty, and IT perspectives. Retrieved from: Educause:
http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ers1414.pdf

Educause Evolving Technologies Committee. (2003). Course Management Systems (CMS). Retrieved
from: http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/DEC0302.pdf

Evans A., Martin K., & Poatsy A.M. . (2015). Technology in Action (11th edition). Pearson.

FearnN. (2016 Nov. 4). Best CMS: The top content management systems of 2016. Retrieved from:
Techradar.pro: http://www.techradar.com/news/best-cms-the-top-content-management-
systems-of-2016

Morrison, K. (2016 April 1 ). 10 Cloud-Based Learning Management Systems For Small Business Training.
Retrieved from: Elearning Industry: https://elearningindustry.com/10-cloud-based-learning-
management-systems-small-business-training

Singh J. (2014). How to use Modle .

Westfall B. (2017 June 2). Learning Content Management Systems. Retrieved from: Software Advice:
http://www.softwareadvice.com/lms/learning-content-management-system-comparison/?
more=true#more
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Figure 1- Timeline Artifact