What is a Trail?

Although we call them Trails, the learning materials that can be created using i-Guide can take almost any form – tour guides or random explorations, lessons, study or revision aids.

A Trail can be a straightforward, linear, step-by-step lesson or tour through a gallery, or it can fully exploit the system’s flexibility to allow self-guided study driven by an individual’s interests, or a serendipitous voyage around a museum collection.

Tools available include text, images, video, audio, diagrams, multiple choice, visual hot-spots and many other interactive learning devices. Because the data is hosted externally on the StreetAccess servers and accessed only as required, there is virtually no limit to the amount of information that can be included in a trail. By choosing how much of this data to access the individual user can manage the depth and breadth of their exploration of any subject.

Trails can also be created around external websites, providing controlled and recorded access to the internet for students, or allowing a museum or gallery to offer materials to people unable to visit their collection.

Using a framing device, this puts the trail on the left-hand side of the screen, with web pages from any site selected by the trail creator on the right. Thus you can create a virtual visit to a museum or a study aid to a particular subject, from crystal formation to Roman Britain, with related internet links chosen and vetted by teachers.

Click here to see a simple example of this sort of trail.

Click on images below for a larger version