Online annotation – Research and practices

Annotation can be a valuable exercise when trying to understand new information. The technique can be used to create a ‘condensed’ version of the original information for later review and to add additional information into the existing document. The growth in web-based learning materials and information sources has created requirement for systems that allow annotations to be attached to these new sources and, potentially, shared with other learners. This paper discusses annotation in an educational context and introduces some of the web annotation systems currently available. It also provides an overview of the development of a new system, eLAWS, by the authors, based upon the Web Service architecture. Finally, the paper provides suggestions for the future development of e-Learning Annotation tools.