Some evaluation criteria for educational multimedia applications

This article is a fragmented overview of my personal baggage and considerations of evaluation criteria for educational multimedia. So let me begin with the single most important evaluation criteria: Use you own common sense. Your first impression normally says a lot, and you will quite soon sense it if it is quality stuff you are dealing with. Having said that, of course a number of more or less explicit pedagogical and technical evaluation criteria can be formulated. For many years various bodies have produced checklists for the evaluation of educational software. Some are just headlines, others are more detailed. Notice that multimedia is not a new thing, only the word is. Ten years ago 'multi' meant text (and drawings). Now the technical communication tools have become more sophisticated, adding sound, photos and video to the scene, not forgetting improved and more easy interaction with the software. But it is still educational software. A number of previous evaluation studies have been excellently summarised and commented upon by Squires and McDougall [1]. Many others exist, e.g. back in 1985, 1987 helpful software evaluation guidelines were published by the Council of Ministers of Education, Canada [2], and The Toronto Board of Education. [3].