Forum Discussion

AishaSterling's avatar
AishaSterling
Community Member
3 years ago

Replacing SCORM content from a different authoring tool with a RISE 360 course

Hi everyone,  I have been trying to look for a tidy answer to the following questions, as I am new to LMS's and Authoring tools but I am not having much luck. We currently use an LMS to host our e...
rise 360
RussellEngoran's avatar
RussellEngoran
Community Member
3 years ago

Hi Aisha,

Were the current courses written to SCORM guidelines?
Are the courses live and already contain user course history?
If so, then it is never recommended to simply overwrite a SCORM course with a different set of files.

Yes, it may launch if the starting files are named the same, but you risk corrupting any currently recorded user data and also booting learners, who could be mid-course, out of the learning experience which is never good. Plus it is unlikely that any IT team would allow you to overwrite the files anyway.

However, the good news is the scenario you describe is literally what course versioning is intended to address. I don't know what LMS you are using, but typically it goes like this:

  1. You create your new content separately and export/package using the SCORM format of your choice.
  2. Tell your LMS admin that you need to upload a new version of an existing course.
  3. Standard LMS systems will have a selection of options for versioning a course that may include:
    1. New learners who register are only offered the new version.
    2. Current learners (mid-course) can be configured to either be allowed to complete the version they started, or begin the new version from the beginning.
      You would choose the high-level options but you should keep your learners informed.

By allowing the LMS rules to handle the versioning process you eliminate the risk of users losing progress and possibly corrupting the records already stored in the LMS. My advice is don't risk mucking things up if  there is any chance of corrupting current data.

Additionally, the setting you referenced about the option to reset a user within a course applies to how users "Resume" the course if they have already started it. This essentially erases a user's progress (except recorded quiz scores), and sets them back to the beginning of the course. I would think that most people prefer to continue a course rather than completely starting over. I hope that helps.

--Russ