Flipping the curriculum
In traditional education, time is a constant and understanding is a variable. In IT_LabWorks™ the student’s understanding of a subject is a constant and time is the variable; only when the first learning objective is mastered, does the student move on to the next objective.
A personalized learning environment
Students do their assignments in IT_LabWorks™, which tracks their performance. The resulting data is used to tailor the course to the individual, instead of trying to fit all students in the same box. Since IT_LabWorks™ monitor the students’ progress, grade their assignments, and provide new lessons when students are confused, we take a lot of the work out of the instructor’s lap. Instructors can use the extra time checking in one-on-one to offer customized support to students who are struggling.
IT_LabWorks™ engages the student
Our pioneering virtual environment is stimulating and prompts creative, analytical and critical thinking. Students become so immersed in the experential learning that they do not realize they are accomplishing educational goals. We aim to build on Marshall McLuhan’s concept that: “Everybody experiences far more than he understands. Yet it is experience, rather than understanding, that influences behavior.”
IT_LabWorks™ makes content come to life
IT_LabWorks not only harness the computing power available to optimize the user’s learning experience; additionally it ensures that the unique strength of the media is leveraged to the learner’s fullest advantage.
By creating the IT_LabWorks virtual corporate world, case studies can be presented in context. Problems that are expressed in context are better understood and therefore more engaging to the student. Our virtual company, the Bonanza Mining Corporation, offers new ways to visualize, experience, and assess the issues at hand and their solutions.
IT_LabWorks™ flips the curriculum
By flipping the curriculum we put the student at the center of the learning cycle. The virtual environment in IT_LabWorks™ is advancing online teaching methods, especially in the way it makes students see that it is the day to day business needs of the corporation that determine their tasks, not curriculum – not exam objectives.
IT_LabWorks™: The complete digital solution
With IT_LabWorks, you study by doing – that is, by completing labs. Although the labs are at the center of the IT_LabWorks learning cycle, all the other resources necessary to prepare for your next IT certification are also included:
- Scenario-based labs
- Task-based labs
- Simulated exams and objective-specific quizzes
- Interactive approved content
- Video demonstrations
- Narrated instructions
All of the student’s educational needs are met in one place where all the study assets “talk to each other” in the sense that all the information in any given lab is context-sensitive within that lab and its tasks. If a student is in the midst of setting up a VPN and clicks on the eBook button, they will instantly be taken to the VPN sub-chapter of the curriculum. If they then click Quiz-Me, IT_LabWorks will take them to the type of questions that address the exam objectives that covers VPN. If they just need quick help on that VPN setup, clicking on Show-me will bring up a video demonstration that teaches how to complete the task they are attempting.