Abstract Content (up to 300 words recommended)
The Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF) has focused Australian HE providers on the specification and validation of graduate learning outcomes for all undergraduate and post graduate courses/programs.
The challenge for HE providers is to demonstrate that the design and delivery of component subjects/units employ approaches to teaching and assessment that ensure that the intended learning outcomes of the course/program, as a whole, are met.
A key implication of this is that enterprise learning management systems (LMSs) require functionality that supports curriculum alignment; that is, functionality based on giving equal logical status to the attributes of the component parts (subjects/units) and to the relationships between the component parts.
The logic that underpins the design of LMSs at RMIT is based on a view that the course/program is primarily an aggregation of discrete and independent subjects/units and, as a result, the strength and direction of the interdependencies between the component subjects/units is largely ignored.
The curriculum mapping tool (CMT) emerged in response to the inability to provide teaching and support staff with alignment data. Due to parallel redevelopment of core elements of the LMS and curriculum design policies, the CMT has shaped, and has been shaped by, the organisation’s enterprise-wide curriculum management systems and policy architecture.
While full integration is yet to be achieved, the feedback to date indicates that the CMT offers a rich landscape of new opportunities on which evidence based curriculum design and delivery can be framed.
This paper describes the iterative development of the CMT between 2012 and 2014. Four development cycles are described within an action research framework. In addition, a model of innovation drawn from Actor Network Theory is used to provide insight into the way the CDT has been translated from an abstract idea into a concrete reality.
Addressing the theme/s of the Conference (up to 200 words recommended)