Many practitioners think that learning research is pie-in-the-sky information that is of value for academics but of little value for practitioners. But good practitioner research is practical research that points practitioners and their managers towards better practice and helps them make the important decisions.

There are a number of misunderstandings and misconceptions about the Experience API (xAPI). Many learning departments and organizations aren’t quite sure what the benefits are of xAPI and how to integrate it into their learning solutions. In a time when mobile technologies and informal workplace environments are on the rise, designing comprehensive learning programs to take advantage of these devices and environments can be daunting without the right technology to tie it all together, one that will help improve learning overall.

The tools and technologies that exist today in large learning and development organizations are complex, and they don’t always play nice with each other. This makes it very difficult to build useful reports from the results of learning experiences in multiple systems. One of the new tools that is available that can address this problem is the Experience API (xAPI).

Interest in the Experience API has grown steadily in the last few years, but most of the conversations exploring the topic were either conceptual or technical in nature. There have few case studies showing the xAPI in practice, and those that did exist focused more on the technical application of the specification rather than on business value.

We have all experienced huge courses, documents, and texts that are barely manageable by the instructional designer. In fact, much of how we design courses and even our documents makes it impossible for an employee to find the one piece of information they need at the time they need it. Since content is so dense, it makes finding meaningful information difficult, and it makes tracking anything useful in it even more difficult.

As you start to explore the Experience API (xAPI), it is easy to feel intimidated. If you lack the necessary coding skills to build a solution from the ground up, taking advantage of xAPI might not be possible without outside help since being able to prototype a solution is critical to the success of your project. Successful prototypes can help show what data is important and what changes you could make before creating a final product for release.

The Experience API is still an emerging technology. While the specification has matured over the last few years, most organizations approach xAPI conversation with more questions than answers.

The Experience API (xAPI) has become a very popular topic in our industry. It seems everywhere you look someone is talking about it and how it will change the way we look at learning. And it may well do that. But is the xAPI right for you and your organization? Is now the right time for the xAPI?