Teachers' Appreciation of a Collaborative Environment on LOs

Learning Objects (LOs) can be a valuable tool to diffuse pedagogical innovation among teachers. We suggest that LOs repositories should be structured so to become a means to improve the pedagogical quality of teachers' work, and motivate them to get involved both as users and co-constructors. In this paper we describe LODE (Learning Objects Discussion Environment) a collaborative environment where users share their experience on LOs by commenting the items in the repository, expliciting relations among them and contributing new LOs. A prototype was used with a group of trainee high school teachers. The outcomes of this experience show novice teachers' interest and appreciation for this approach.